Reach for Something That's Already Gone
by Ninazadzia
Summary: Of course I fell in love with Sam. We went through hell together, and when everything seemed messed up, we were there for each other. Yeah, emotional sex with her was wrong, but so right. We could never get enough of each other. M for Seddie lemons, R&R
1. Ten Years

**A/N:** For those of you that are familiar with my one-shot _Lies and Walls, _that was something of an outtake of this much, MUCH longer story. Hope you guys enjoy~

Blessings,

Vikki

PS. I do not follow the show's Seddie storyline for this fic. I thought it was something of a let-down, personally, so I figured I'd make their story a little more . . . M-rated. Heheh.

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter 1

_Ten Years_

The little things I remember trip me up the most. Like how she would always smell like a combination of cotton t-shirts and bacon, how I knew she was laughing hard whenever she started snorting, how she would sometimes wander off and get a look in her eye that told me she was thinking about something less than pleasant. Passing the brunette on the street that day, I caught that familiar smell that was Sam. I cringed, figuring I had somewhere important to be for the sake of having an excuse to walk faster, just so I could avoid a wave of incoming nostalgia.

_Let it go._

Those always seemed to be the words. _Let it go, Benson. _Those were the words I would say whenever I passed another girl with the same blonde curls, bored expression, or slightly bowlegged stride as _her. _Those were words I recited in my head at night, over and over again until I'd found a reason to fall asleep.

It had been nearly a decade. And everything still reminded me of her.

There was a rush of cool air. I found myself back in reality. _Coffee time, _I reminded myself. _Time to stop dwelling. _I didn't want to say that I could never stop dwelling, because then I would be lying. On both my better and worse days, _she _wouldn't be the subject of my thoughts. I had a wife. I had two kids. They provided plenty of distractions.

I plastered a smile across my face. _Lies, _I thought. It wasn't one of my better days.

"Morning Fred," the cashier told me. Her name was Emma. What little I knew about her wasn't important—she was a really bubbly, young woman, aged late twenties and was getting married to her fiancée once they could manage financially. Was she nice to talk to? I guess so. Did she save me a good few minutes of time in the morning by letting me cut the line at Starbucks, already having my coffee ready? Probably.

Did she mean anything to me? No. Not to say the least.

"Morning Emma," I replied.

"You're presenting today, right?" she asked me, handing over my cup with caution. She was a something of a klutz.

I nodded, smiling in a way that made my jaw hurt. "Yeah, I am. Hopefully I won't get nailed for using powerpoint."

She scrunched her nose. "I still don't get why you present like that. It's such an old processor, isn't it?"

I shrugged, pulling the morning paper out of my bag. "Old isn't necessarily bad."

She rolled her eyes. "Okay then," she said, wishing me luck as she turned to the other customers.

I grabbed the morning paper out of my bag, sitting down at a table and looking out the windows of the coffee shop into the grey Seattle sky. I didn't know exactly what fueled my decision to come back. Everything I'd ever come to know in Seattle was shit. The Shays, the Pucketts, that slime dog Tyler…it was all a load of crap that I could do without.

_You know why you're here, Freddie._

I sighed. Of course I remembered why I'd come back. I came back, hoping she would be here. Though I knew it wasn't possible, I couldn't fight the urge to get another look at her face, just to confirm that what we had—whatever it was—had been _real. _I couldn't live with the premonition that our time together had been nothing but a sick dream, like I sometimes thought it was.

As I stared down at the newspaper, my heart sank.

The familiar date of August 24th was stamped across the top of the page. I shook my head, not able to believe it. To the date, it had been exactly ten years, and I was still living in the past. I was still indulging on the hope and fantasies that someday she would come back, and we could pick up right where we left off.

I sat there, unable to move. My presentation slipped from my mind entirely. Screw it. It wasn't like my job meant much to me anyway. I just wanted to sit there and think about us. I wanted one last day to remember Sam Puckett in her entirety. I wanted to remember how it began, how it ended, and how far we'd come.

XXX

"Hell do I love Seattle." I looked up, reluctant to hear something coming out of Sam's mouth. She tore her eyes away from the window and gave me a smile. "D'you think this snowstorm will be enough for them to call off school tomorrow?"

Normally, I would've rolled my eyes. "We wish."

"Fuck school."

I smiled. "You've only got six more months of it, Sam. Then you're free."

"What makes you think I'm not going to college?"

I caught her eye, and despite her efforts, she found herself laughing alongside me. "Oh, right," she said. "Optional school? Ick."

"So, tell me, Ms. Mysterious," I began, motioning for her to sit next to me. "You've put off telling me and Carly long enough—_what _are you doing after we graduate?"

She shrugged. I expected the usual, 'I dunno,' or the better, 'Mind your business, Fredward.'

"Maybe I'll go work out East."

I laughed. "You? An East-coaster?"

She punched me. "Oh, shut up…"

"Look out New York, Boston, DC-here comes Sam Puckett," I taunted.

She rolled her eyes. "Actually…nah, maybe not. East Coast is going to be your turf anyway." She stood up, walking across the room and digging through the Shay's cooler. She pulled out two beers, and tossed one to me. I was surprised she didn't chuck it at my head.

"I just can't believe you don't have a plan," I said.

"I roll with the punches, Benson. Don't go worrying about me, you have your own shit to worry about anyway."

I sighed, nodding in agreement. "Amen," I said, taking a sip from my can. Drinking wasn't a habit I exercised often in High School, but at the time, I'd been dumped on my ass by a girlfriend of eight months and had a lonnnnng weekend of tech conventions with the AV club ahead of me. It wasn't like I drowned myself in booze during times of stress, but I also wasn't completely innocent to stress drinking.

I wasn't like Sam, though. She'd get drunk just for the hell of it, no stress required.

"So," she asked, "Where d'you think Carly's at?"

"Not sure. She said she'd be home by six . . ."

Almost as if on cue, the door to the Shays swung open. When Sam and I turned around to see Carly, she'd already run halfway across the room and made a beeline for the telephone. Her jacket was sliding off one shoulder and her hair was in her face; it looked like she'd been chased down the streets of Seattle, screaming bloody murder.

"Carls! Where've you been?"

Sam and I both got up, stopping in our tracks simultaneously when we realized Carly's panting was actually sobbing, and that her face was wet with tears. She dialed a three-digit number into the phone, her hands shaking.

Next came the mixture of confused and surprised exclamations, with profanities coming out of Sam's mouth more than I think she'd ever like to admit. Because in all the years we'd known Carly, we'd never seen her look so dead terrified.

"Jesus Christ!" "Fuck, this can't be good . . ." "What happened?"

"Spencer," she cried, "It's Spencer."

"What?"

"Carly . . ." I said.

She brought the phone to her ear, slamming her fist down on the counter. Sam and I looked at her with searching eyes as she managed to choke out, "He dropped his keys in the street, he turned back around to get them . . . they didn't see him . . ."

The wheels turning in my head, I was suddenly back two years ago, lying in the middle of the street myself after being hit by a taco truck.

"Where, Carly," Sam demanded.

"The corner . . ."

And with that, without a word to each other or a word to her, Sam and I were out the door, sprinting down three flights of stairs. We did it almost robotically, and while we should've been bracing ourselves for the worst, all we could think of was the look on Carly's face when she'd walked through the door. There was no way. No way in hell could anything that bad could've happened to Spencer Shay. There's no way. There couldn't _be _any way.

Flinging the doors of the lobby open, we hit pavement, running into the stormy January air and down the block. Far off sirens wailed in the air. I was the one of us to stop first, covering my mouth the minute we got close enough to the corner, not daring to take another step forward if my life depended on it. Like with everything else, though, Sam ran on, headfirst into what she knew would make all of our lives shit.

I couldn't see him. Pedestrians had crowded around Spencer, some trying to help, some frantically calling an ambulance on their cell phones, and others staring in shock. I was the doofus staring in shock an extra fifteen feet away, not able to see anything, not wanting to know what'd happened and what it meant. Sam pushed through the crowd of people, shoving them out of her way with all the powers of heaven and hell.

"Move, _move!_"she screamed. "Fuck, out of my way, that's my brother!"

I wouldn't stop to think of what she'd said until later, because the expression on her face was something I'll never forget. Her mouth opened as if she'd gotten the nastiest shock of her life, and you could tell all she was thinking was No. No. Nonono.

And then she let out the most mangled, awful scream I've heard in my life.

"_Spencer!"_

She jerked me out of my trance, and acting out of the most primitive instincts inside of me, I ran forward to face her and to face what I knew was all Hell breaking loose. And as the sirens continued in the air, and as I processed the fact that Carly's call had gotten through and that help was on the way, I knew it didn't mean anything, because I saw how this story would end.

In Sam's arms was the lifeless body of Spencer Shay.

**A/N:** So I'm _probably _going to get some hate for killing Spencer off in the first chapter, but this does set the story's frame.

Thank you so much for reading! I appreciate all reviews, comments and feedback

Blessings,

Vikki


	2. The Aftermath

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Two

_Aftermath_

And suddenly, I was back in present day Seattle, with a cup of coffee in my hand and the newspaper in front of me. By now the morning rush had filed out, and I was one of maybe five other people left, the only one looking like they had grounds to work in commercial America. Of all the reveries I've had of Sam, that was something else. Because that day—that stormy day in January—Goddamnit, that was where our downward spiral of blinding insanity began. It was the day of Carly's brother's death.

_How poetic,_ I thought. Enough time had passed for me to feel no shame in being bitter, because in all honesty, I spent five long years mourning Spencer and trying to avenge his life every damn day. His death marked the day my life went off track from the one I was destined to have—the one where Carly, Sam and I went our respective ways after high school. The one where I'd graduate from MIT with a degree in engineering, whisk a girl off her feet with my oh-so-dorky charm, and watch as—one by one—all of my friends would walk down the aisle with their special someones, starting most likely with Carly and her college sweetheart and ending (after years of romantic denial and steamy one-night stands) with Sam and whatever man had managed to finally impregnate her at that point.

Fuck that, though.

I didn't only lose Spencer that day; that was the start of the perfect storm that royally fucked my life up. All I could feel for weeks after that was the pain of suddenly losing Spencer—a friend, a role-model, and a brother I never had. But of the three of us, I took it the best. It didn't seem it then, but now that I'm looking back at it in retrospect, Sam was never the same after that. Even years after he was gone—when Sam and I had gone too far off the deep end together and knew all we had were each other—Sam never managed to regain what little hope she had for her life.

Yeah, so we all knew Sam would be the textbook wild child after high school; me, Carly and Gibby would be in completely different corners of the world, Carly most likely studying abroad, myself in Boston and Gibby joining the military (who would've known?), with no one around to tell Sam "you can't" or "you shouldn't." But she'd pull herself together, and it would only be a matter of time. She'd have her fair share of drug runs, yeah, and probably some less-than-sane sexual encounters, but that was Sam for you.

After Spencer, it was almost shut-down for her. No drug runs, no one-night stands, and no mature revelation somewhere down the line; all she could do was monotonously plod along with whatever life gave her, because what was the point of acting out and living reckless when living didn't mean a thing? When it could be taken away from you in the blink of an eye?

That's how it was for a long time with Sam. But gradually, Sam grew up, and every day became less of a battle and more of a gift for her, as I'd learn very well.

Sam and I moved on; slowly but surely (and even more slowly for Sam), the pain faded. It was Carly who came out of this crippled. It was Carly that didn't know how to function, and she didn't realize she was in so deep that when she tried to claw her way back to the surface, there was nothing left but spite.

Carly was the one that fucked everything up. And, setting my coffee cup down, I closed my eyes, and was suddenly back in the aftermath of Spencer.

XXX

Spencer wouldn't have liked it if he'd known we wore somber shades of gray to his funeral. He'd like it even less if he known that the tension in the atmosphere was practically tangible. Had he been there, he probably would've jumped out of his seat and told us to snap out of it. His life was worth celebrating. He'd had enough happiness in his thirty-some years for a dozen men.

The funeral wasn't even the worst of it, though. The worst of it was the aftermath. That limbo that the four of us found ourselves stuck in, where the present was too painful to live in but moving forward seemed like a sick joke. We all subconsciously hid for four weeks, not sending a single call, text or email to each other because the idea of talking about anything was next to impossible. There was so much to say, and at the same time, there was absolutely nothing at all.

So we waited. And for a solid month, we retreated in our own respective ways. I can't remember much from that time beyond re-kindling my addiction to online solitaire. Trying to even imagine how Carly was is a flat-out insult to her, I never heard too much from Gibby after that day, and from what little Sam has told me about that time, she spent most of those four weeks blacked-out. It was a call from Gibby telling us he was leaving town that snapped us out of our dream-life and sent us back to the real world.

"What d'you mean you're leaving?" I'd said. "Is this about Spencer?"

"Not really. I heard back from Westpoint before Christmas, and I was invited to stay on campus before school starts this June."

A whole string of questions raced through my mind as Gibby rambled on about Westpoint, and how leaving town would be the easiest thing for him to do considering he had all of his graduation credits. Quite honestly, all that was on my mind was the word "Westpoint."

"_Westpoint?"_ I interrupted. "You mean the _military school?"_

"Yeah."

"Gibs, I thought you were kidding when you said you wanting to join the army."

"Navy, Freddie," he corrected.

"And they start school in June?"

I could tell he was shrugging. "That's how it works, I guess."

My mouth must've hung open for a good minute before I managed to say something. "Fuck, you're serious."

"No shit."

Neither of us said anything for a minute, and the thought that dawned on me next was the reason Gibby and I would barely say a word to each other for another five years. "This _does _have something to do with Spencer."

"Freddie—"

"You're leaving town because you don't want to face Carly again." I didn't even notice I was raising my voice.

"That's not it. Okay, so maybe that's _part _of it, but I heard from them before the accident."

I bitterly retorted, "But leaving halfway through your senior to go to military school didn't cross your mind until after Spencer was dead, did it?"

All I could make sense of next was Gibby trying to choke something out, to defend himself from I'd just said. "No—well, kind of—but it makes sense—I don't see any reason—"

"Gibby, you are an _asshole."_

"Freddie, it's for the best," he said. "I might have the brains for a military school, but I'll need more time than everyone else to get the brawn."

Fuming, I said, "Like you give a shit."

"Well, you know what?" he exclaimed. I could tell that I'd finally hit a sore spot, because I'd never heard Gibby sound so angry in his life. "It's not my fault you, Sam and Carly have been catatonic _zombies _of the past month. I'm as upset as any of you are, but I have to move on with my life, and I can't do that around you three!"

"Oh, so now this is all about _you. _Yeah, Sam and I are hurt, but what about _Carly?_ She needs all of the help she can get right now!"

I knew I'd been asking for it, and that was it. That was the truth that'd been staring me in the face, and that Gibby had the balls to say.

"You look in the mirror, Freddie, and look yourself right in the eye. And you go ahead and tell yourself that you haven't been avoiding me, Carly or Sam since the accident, and that you've been the best friend you can be to Carly right now."

Silence. That was all I could manage. I wanted so badly to refute what he was saying, and to tell him he was wrong. But I knew Gibby. I knew he didn't lie, and I knew he was right. He'd hit the nail right on the head. Blaming him for leaving town made me the biggest hypocrite in the world, because as far as I was concerned, I'd done just about the same thing. In fact, I'd done worse. I was still physically in Seattle, living across the hall from Carly Shay, not even able to open my front door to do anything except drive to school in the mornings and come home in the afternoons. And all the while, I'd left my best friend to mourn by herself.

I hung up the phone, not wanting to deal anything or anyone. But I knew I had to.

XXX

"Hey, Sam?"

"Hmmm?"

"It's Freddie."

"Oh."

…

…

"Hi Freddie."

"How've you been?"

A snort."Please. Like my emotional state means anything."

"I was just asking."

A sigh. "Cut to the chase, Benson."

"Have you heard from Gibby recently?"

"No. Why?"

"He's leaving town, Sam."

"Whattya mean he's leaving town?"

"He was invited to spend some time at Westpoint before school starts, and he decided he's going to do it."

"_Westpoint?_ The fuck?"

"Yeah, crazy, I know—"

"Freddie, it sounds like he was BS'ing you."

"That's what I thought. But I think he's serious about leaving, Sam."

"_What?_ Why the fuck would he do that?"

I sighed. "I think you can answer that question yourself."

…

…

…

"Oh."

…

…

"Well, then what the hell are we supposed to do about it?"

"I think we should tell Carly."

"Yeah, no shit."

"In person, Sam."

…

…

…

"You're right. We should."

XXX

It was the day after Valentine's day when I picked up Sam to drive her to Carly's. Normally, she would've taken the subway (or at the very least have driven herself), but I had a sinking feeling in my stomach that the minute I got off the phone with her, Sam was going to get drunk enough to elicit any form of emotion out of her. She'd be there, alright, and she'd be herself and she'd give Carly the reassuring words she needed, but she wouldn't have to remember her acting like a normal human being the next morning.

The issue with being drunk en route to a friend's house, though, is that there was a very high possibility Sam would take a subway to Timbuktu, or something along those lines. Driving her to Carly's seemed like the most fool-proof thing to do.

I stepped up onto the porch and rang the doorbell. Surprisingly enough, Sam had some form of composure walking out the doorway. She gave me a nod, said a quick "Hey," and walked to the car without another word.

I held the door open for her. "Not drunk?"

"Nope. Just a little buzzed." She shut the door, staring into the windshield.

As we drove down the road, I couldn't help but notice the thick, tangible silence in the car. "Sam?"

"Hm?"

"Really, how've you been?"

I didn't expect the answer she gave me. "I feel more clear-headed buzzed than I do when I'm sober." She turned to me, and her eyes seemed bottomless. "What do you think?"

It was weird, being in the same car as her. This was a girl I'd known for forever—one that'd harassed me through most of my childhood, and the one that'd given me my first kiss. You'd think that a month of only seeing each other in the hallway in between classes wouldn't have affected us much, and I'd be able to see the same girl as I did before. Strangely, I didn't.

Thinking aloud, I said, "The three of us need to be there for each other."

"Well, we haven't been." I heard some sadness in her voice.

"That's about to change."

I gave her a small smile. Thankfully, she returned it.

**A/N: **Hope you guys enjoyed! To give you guys an idea of my schedule for this fic, updates will be every Thursday.

Feedback, comments and reviews are appreciated :D

Thanks for reading!

Vikki


	3. Carly's Request

A/N: Whoa, what's this! An update on a _Tuesday!_

So even though I said updates would be every Thursday, I'm kind of jumping the gun on that because I'm was too excited about what I've already written for chapter four and I want to have than online ASAP. I can be cool like that.

Updates will (hopefully) be consisted. I have a loaded schedule, and so far, it hasn't gotten the best of me. Yet.

Xoxo

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Three

_Carly's Request_

The Shay's apartment was as loud as it had been before, and exactly as I remembered it. I was littered with Spencer's sculptures, and the same bright posters hung on the walls. The atmosphere of it was as it'd always been—bright, happy, and welcoming. It was still very much Spencer's apartment, and that was exactly why Carly seemed so out of place in it.

"D'you guys want anything to drink?" she asked.

Sam said "Yes" and I said "No" at the exact same time.

Unfazed, Carly walked across the room and was back in a flash with two iced teas. I forced myself to look her in the eye, because after four weeks of no physical contact, I owed it to myself and to her to see the damage done. I couldn't see any familiarity in the face I was looking at. Her eyes looked like black beads, and though reading Carly's expression was usually like reading an open book, this was the first time in my memory I didn't know what to make of it.

Sam and I awkwardly sat down next to each other, facing across from her.

"Guys, I really appreciate you being here," she said. "I thought for a second . . ."

From a sensitive side of her that came out of nowhere, Sam reached out across the space between her and Carly and grabbed her hand. "Don't say it," she said. "We know. We've been lousy friends. And we're sorry."

All I could do was stare. Maybe Sam was a little more than buzzed after all.

I thought I saw Carly's lip tremble for a second, but miraculously, she held it together. "I can't do this on my own," she said quietly.

Sam's gaze flickered in my direction. I could tell what she was thinking. _We can't tell her about Gibby. Not like this. Not when she's on the verge of having a mental breakdown._

It only took a split second for me to make up my mind.

_I'm sorry, Sam._

"Carly, we have something to tell you about Gibby." I tried not to look in Sam's direction, wanting to avoid the daggers she was probably shooting me. "Gibby's . . . taken off."

I could hear her breath hitch. "What d'you mean?"

_Shit. This is going to be bad. _"He's leaving town, Carly. For school. It was kind of a last minute choice."

She looked so horrified, I forfeited my dignity and looked down. What the hell was wrong with me? You don't break bad news to a grieving girl like _that. _I replayed what I said over and over again in my head, and every time I did, it sounded worse. And, all the while, Sam continued to surprise me, jumping off our couch and onto Carly's, pulling her into the most sincere hug I'd ever seen her give up until that point in my life.

And all I could do was sit there, like a fish out of water.

"He's an asshole, Carly, don't think about him for a second," Sam said.

And, as if on cue, the crying started. Carly, who was usually a shy crier, would've brought her hand up to her face, trying to stop the tears that were flowing from her eyes. Her sobs were completely silent. If anything, that just made it sadder, seeing the tears roll down her face like they did, and her making no attempt to stop them, letting all of her walls down and wearing her sorrows on her sleeve like a heart.

"H-he wouldn't just leave . . ."

"Shh, Carls—"

"Not without saying goodbye. He's G-gibby." She shut her eyes, weeping uncontrollably by now. "He wouldn't d-do that to me!"

Sam looked at me, helpless, holding our sobbing friend in her arms, completely at a loss and not knowing what to do. In truth, I wasn't sure either. I'd always known Carly was emotionally fragile, but this was something else. This was . . . an extreme.

And it was in that moment that the full impact of Spencer and Gibby finally hit me, and the shock I'd been living in more four weeks started to wear off. Because sitting there and looking into the face of my friend showed me everything I'd miss now that Spencer was gone, because he'd never come back and never could. How I'd never get to talk to him again, to be around him, to crack jokes with him or spend a night a night on his couch when my mom got too overbearing.

These thoughts had crossed my mind before, obviously, but never like this.

And before I knew it, I was the one having to try and hold back tears. Boys don't cry. Crying in front of Carly would be selfish. I had to be stronger than that, and I owed her that as her friend. I owed her that and so much more.

Some single tears rolled down my face, but I inhaled, sucking all of the air out of the room and trying to hold them back. _You have to be strong. Be strong for her. _

Sam had a rock-hard resolve for not breaking down. Her expression was something else entirely. If I thought Carly was hard to read, then Sam was nearly impossible. There'd be a time in the future when I'd know more about the girl with the blonde curls, and exactly what was going on in her head. But we'd have to go through hell and back first before I got to that point, and that moment on Carly's couch on the day after Valentine's Day, that was only the start of our hell.

Our hell started when she became helpless.

"Carly . . . shh . . ."

"Why would he do that to me?" she whispered. "Why would he leave?"

"Carly, I'm sorry," I managed to choke out.

"I'm all alone."

And that was where I knew both mine and Sam's hearts had been broken. Because we knew that _that_ much was our fault.

"You're not," Sam said fiercely.

"Not anymore." I reached out, putting my hand on Carly's knee. She gave me something of a terrified expression, which made it all the more difficult for me to reject the offer Carly was about to make, and the very offer that had Sam and I turned down could've ended our incoming hell right then and there.

"I don't want you two to leave," she said. "I-I can't go through the next four years of my life without you two."

Sam and I looked at each other. "Just tell us what you need us to do, Carly," she said.

It only took a second before I realized what Carly was asking. And, at first, it made my gut churn.

"D'you want me to go to school with you?" I asked.

She shook her head. "I'm not going to school. Not after this." She took a deep breath. "I . . . I'm staying in Seattle."

Sam instantaneously said, "I'll stay with you."

The look she then gave me made my heart skip a beat, and made me feel more than ashamed for thinking for even a second that I wasn't going to respect my desperate friend's request.

I finally managed, "I'm not going anywhere."

What I saw next on Carly's face was the first red flag I'd ever see in the next years. I'd expected gratitude, or embarrassment for her even asking a question like that. Because, in all the years I'd known Carly, she was never selfish. She'd put others first even if her life was on the line. She looked like she'd just been given the biggest relief of her life, hearing that me and Sam were staying with her.

_She's not being selfish,_ a part of me snapped. _This is the least I can do for her after what she's been through._

There was that other side of me that wanted to refute it so badly, and drowning it out was almost impossible. I'd think later about MIT, and about what leaving all of that behind for Carly meant. But at that very moment on that day, I didn't have a choice. My choice was made both by me and for me. And that choice was staying with Carly in Seattle.

Sam's face lit up, suddenly. "Carls . . . d'you want to keep doing iCarly?"

"What?" Carly asked, surprised.

Sam looked at me. "I know we said we'd stop the show, but that was because we'd be separated. And now we're not."

"We can keep doing iCarly," I thought aloud.

And that, my friends, is the twist. That was the silver lining that stayed with me for those next few months, when I was regretting my decision because I'd be missing out on my dream school, and what I'd spent all of high school slaving over to get into. It was all worth it because I'd get to keep doing iCarly. I'd help my friend, and I'd keep the one thing in my life that'd been completely and totally _mine_, and that I only had to share with my two best friends in the entire world. Spencer was dead, but iCarly wasn't.

My days as the iCarly cameraman were back.

A/N: My apologies if this fic has been progressing slowly, the coming chapters after this will be paced much faster. I felt the need to get some character development in first though. This was definitely a more emotion-heavy chapter, I'm well aware, and I was worried I wouldn't get the characters right, but hopefully I did them (some) justice. The next chapter will be less depressing, filled with Sam and Freddie banter, I promise xx

Feedback, reviews and comment are always appreciated. Thanks for reading!

~Vikki


	4. The Next Four Years

A/N: Sorry this update was a little late, I was shooting for Tuesday but I figured a Thursday update in commemoration of the Ides of March and TVD's return from a four week hiatus (!) was fitting :D Review review review babes, for the number of hits this fic's been getting, some of you have been slacking. You know who you are.

-Vikki

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Four

_The Next Four Years_

Going through High School in a city as busy as Seattle, you didn't necessarily need to have a hobby. It wasn't like the suburbs, where you'd be bored shitless if you weren't part of a sport or a club or whatever. You could get by with being a city kid, not having to do much more than see your friends on a regular basis and keep a passing grade in all of your classes, even if it meant you were smoking loads of pot every day. Drug use was extremely common at Ridgeway, because quite frankly, too many people had nothing better to do.

But iCarly was something of my baby back in high school. Yeah, I fenced during the winter, and I was something of an AV dork, but the web show was where all of my time went. I definitely know Sam can say the same, seeing to the fact that had it not been for iCarly, she probably would've been one of those kids getting high in the bathrooms between classes. And as for Carly, I know she cared about it the most of the three of us. iCarly wasn't just a hobby to her—it was her life. It was probably the first thing she thought of waking up in the morning and the last thing going to bed at night. It broke her heart when we did our "last web cast," right before the Christmas of our senior year. I could vividly remember how all five of us—myself, Sam, Carly, Gibby and Spencer—circled up, doing our final segment of random dancing and waving goodbye to our viewers, which at that point had grown to be upwards of ten million.

We were leaving behind something great. But it had to have an end, and that seemed like iCarly's natural conclusion. I'd just heard back from MIT, and that sealed the deal. Freddie was going out East, three thousand miles away from the Shay's loft. Carly, Gibby, and not even Sam could work up the nerve to ask me to trade MIT for a more local college. They knew I was hell-bent on getting in, as I had been since I visited the campus way back in eighth grade. I'd told them that if I didn't get in, I'd consider other schools. I'd see if I could go somewhere local. But I was _definitely _getting in to MIT. I couldn't think of the alternative.

And, just as I'd wanted to, I did. Right before Christmas, I got the letter back home that sent me into the best fit of tears I'd ever have in my life, and what I'm sure were some silent cries from Carly, because it meant that her web show was irrevocably terminated.

But then Spencer died. And everything changed.

I went reeling back to reality, taking a breather from my subconscious. _What are you doing?_ I thought. _Why are you putting yourself through this?_

There was more to all of this than iCarly, than MIT, than Westpoint. These were all stops on the road of a journey named "Sam." There was so much I still could've done at that point that prevented _us_ from ever happening, because up until Carly's request, that'd just been the start. And, somehow, I wound up here, sitting in a coffeshop in the same city that was my living hell all but twelve years ago.

I'd come back to Seattle for Sam. I'd come back hoping I'd get just another look into her eyes, and that was it. I didn't need a kiss on the lips or a hug or a smile or even a wink. All I needed was a look, an acknowledgement, and even that seemed like too much to ask. Fate wasn't on my side.

I smiled bitterly. "I'm getting ahead of myself."

If I was going to relive this story, I had to do it right. Taking up Carly's request as an iCarly cameraman . . . that was only the beginning. It would take another five years before I knew more about the girl with the blonde curls. "Us" was still a long ways away.

So I went back into the depths of my mind, looking for any specific memory or recollection of those five years. And, almost as quickly as I'd gone to that zone, I came back, empty handed, because I knew that I didn't have one specific memory. It wasn't like with Spencer, where I could relive that day over and over again until it drove me senseless. That was vivid, that was real, and that was a once-in-a-lifetime kind of day.

Every day of those next five years after I chose to stay in Seattle, it was all the same.

I was the iCarly cameraman to a show barely recognizable from its ancestor. We didn't do slapstick, kid's comedy. It became raunchy and teenage very quickly, what with all of the sexual cracks Carly and Sam would make to try and lighten the mood. Not that I minded much, because I always sort of had the idea that the show would evolve like that. Though we lost a big portion of our younger fanbase, iCarly became more popular than it ever had been during that time. I guess there's something about a kid's show gone wrong that people can't resist.

During those five years, there was definitely a lot of "going wrong" in that sense. Sam, who usually kept a zipped lip about her sex life, poured it out for me and Carly to see, not leaving much to the imagination. It didn't change the way I saw Sam, necessarily, but it did shame me a little to know that by the time we were twenty-one, she'd slept with about twice as many as I ever had in her first few years of High School alone. Oddly enough, during those five years after Spencer's accident, Sam only had two sexual partners; a hookup from the "catatonic zombie month," and her boyfriend of four years, Tyler.

I tried to suppress the incoming wave of thoughts about that dick. I couldn't get ahead of myself. I had to keep the story moving. Now was not the time to go on a rant about Tyler.

Carly, who'd retained her virginity during High School, was surprising in that department, to say the least. Usually the most open of the three of us about her romantic relationships, she and Sam had something of a role reversal during the new iCarly years. She didn't say so much as a word about her bedroom activities, but it didn't take a rocket scientist to see that she slept around enough to make people raise eyebrows. Goody goody gumdrop Carly Shay was replaced with Carly 2.0. Not that Sam and I noticed much was different about her—not for a while, at least. We knew that she was closeted about her hyper-sexuality, but as far as we knew, she was still Carly. Just . . . older. More mature. She had more sex. Whatever.

We were idiots.

As for me? My romantic life was something of a blur from that time, quite honestly. Remember the eight month girlfriend I talked about earlier? You don't get through an eight month relationship from your Junior to Senior year of High School without somebody deflowering someone else. Granted, we kind of deflowered each other, but that was irregardless. Her name was Tara. She was cute, I guess, and there was something about her that drew us together. It lasted, and it was good. But we saw it as mostly playing around with the idea of what a serious relationship was like, buying into the idea of "puppy love," never letting ourselves feel any of the passion we both obviously craved, because that was the very reason we broke up. "It isn't working out. I just feel like there's something missing, and I don't think I love you like that."

The only person I was upset with or pissed at after that was myself. I didn't see it as a waste of my virginity or eight months of my life, for that matter, but those definitely could've been an eight months better spent. I think we both knew that.

And, there I was again, suddenly getting ahead of myself and jumping to one of the later chapters in this story where I was with _her._ Where _us_ didn't mean practicality or puppy love or trying to make it work—it meant the exact opposite. It meant us loving blindly and fiercely, without any rhyme or reason or ounce of practicality in the world. We were resistant, and we tried so hard to make it fall apart at first, but after a while, we realized that it was all wasted energy. Sam and I would never be able to stay away from each other.

_Stop._ I snapped myself back into focus. _Freddie, stop. You can't think about that. Not yet._

And that I knew. I knew that these flashes of memory were coming too soon, and that I wanted nothing more than to cut to the chase and to get to the part about Sam.

But there were important things to address first. Like Tyler.

XXX

"Mr. Tall Dark and Handsome isn't here yet?"

Sam turned to face me, lighting up. "You've known this kid for four years, and you're _still_ not going to drop the pet name?"

"Well, judging from the way you look at him, it's kind of true." I batted my lashes, throwing Sam a smirk as she rolled her eyes, not bothering to suppress some laughter. Had we been fifteen, she would've thrown something at me.

That was the Summer before I turned twenty-three. We were lazying around my downtown apartment after an iCarly rehearsal, and Sam was getting ready for a night out. She'd been putting her earings in.

"So," I said, "When's the wedding?"

"Nosy much?"

"Maybe. If it wasn't concerning such obvious matters."

"If you could shut your hole that'd be great, thanks."

"Aw, is the bride getting cold feet?"

I knew I was in for it. "_You're _just jealous because you're going to spend your life as a terminal bachelor."

"What makes you say that?"

"If you've got fewer than five sexual partners left before you've slept with someone from every race, believe me, you're bored."

"I'm not bored."

"D'you think you'll start fucking guys soon to get some excitement?"

She flashed me a white smile as I screamed "hey!" slamming the beer I was holding down on the coffee table, being sure to make a mess. She was right, in a sense. I was getting bored with my sex life. I hadn't been in a solid relationship in years, and it was a lot easier to fuck around than to go through the trouble of meeting someone.

Not that Sam would ever get that.

"Since when did _you _become a relationship girl?" I said offhandedly. Now she was slicking on a layer of fire-red lipstick. "If your High School self kept tabs on you, I'm sure she'd be mildly appalled."

"Believe me, I'm all of the hot, sexy badass I used to be. I just don't have to show it off." She narrowed her eyes in on me. "It would blind you," she joked.

Joking or not, she was kind of right. Maybe not so much about the not-showing-it-off part, because the dressed-up Sam I was looking at didn't really fit that statement. Fire red lips set off her features really well, along with the liner she smudged around her eyes. The shiny, patent black dress and matching pumps didn't leave much to the imagination either. At least she was wearing a ski jacket to somewhat-modestly cover it up. Whether I liked it or not, it was hard to deny—she could be a total bombshell when she wanted to.

"Where are you guys going, a night club?"

"_No_, a soup kitchen." She rolled her eyes. "What d'you think?"

I nodded. "Keep the table dancing to a minimum. We wouldn't want innocent bystanders seeing your hoo-ha or anything."

She opened her mouth to say something, but in that instant, another voice said, "I don't think I'd mind that."

Of course Tyler had to walk in right in time for my most overtly sexual crack. Granted, it's not like I cared much, because he knew that the extent of our romantic history was an eight second kiss during our Freshman year of High School. I doubt he gave a crap either. I had nothing on this kid. He strolled on in, looking like he'd jumped right out of an episode of _The Vampire Diaries,_ what with the smoldering look he was giving Sam and the complimentary motorcycle jacket.

_He's too tan to be a vampire, _I thought offhandedly.

"Hey gorgeous," he said to Sam. Had I not been there, he probably would've given her a kiss. "You ready to head out?"

"Yeah, lemme just grab my keys."

She doubled back into the bathroom, leaving me and Tyler alone for a few minutes. It wasn't awkward because Tyler and I knew each other well. We weren't close enough to be friends, but I didn't have any issues with him. Not at that point, at least. To me, he was Sam's slick, slightly broody and surprisingly romantic boyfriend. To him, I was probably Sam's tech friend with an affinity for beer pong and meaningless hookups.

"Doing all right, Benson?"

I nodded. "Just fine. You two going anywhere special?"

"Oh, this new place uptown—the guys at the office won't stop talking about it. The drinks are cheap, so we figured we'd give it a shot." He sat down on the couch next to me. "You spending the night in?"

"Kind of. Carly was talking about coming over."

Carly. It was difficult to begin with that girl. It'd been four and a half years since Spencer's death, and I could never shake the feeling that there were things going on in Carly's life that I didn't know about. Things that had changed her.

"Carly?" Tyler gave me a smile was over-the-top flashy, even for him. "You two should come with us!"

I thought for a minute before I reacted. I'd gotten very good with hiding surprise. Especially around Carly, whenever she made an offhanded, rude remark that would bother myself and Sam.

"Aw, thanks man, but I'm not really feeling anything tonight."

"No, come on. I _insist,"_ he said, giving me a punch in the shoulder.

We locked gazes for a second, and I knew that trying to get out of it would look weird. It wasn't that I minded being around Sam and Tyler. What I had an issue with was being around Sam, Tyler and _Carly._ The dynamic was strange, for some reason.

I tried to shake the thought from my head. "You know what, yeah, why not?"

"Excellent." He clapped me on the shoulder.

A/N: A quick disclaimer—for those of you that are fellow TVD fans, the Tyler in this chapter is _not _Mystic Falls' Tyler Lockwood. I was going for a more Damon Salvatore-sy feel, but the name "Tyler," the description of him being from the Vampire Diaries and the fact that I said he's tan does read very Tyler. My apologies. Tyler in this fic a dick, Tyler Lockwood at the very least is sexy as hell :D

Hope you guys enjoyed this chappie—more Sam and Freddie banter to come. The next two chapters are super significant/exciting/etc. The pace will pick up substantially.

Thanks for reading! Reviews are always appreciated, my lovelies

Blessings,

Vikki


	5. Club Night

7

A/N: Ahh, I like this chapter. There's banter, there's action, there's foreshadowing . . . ugh, love. Hopefully chapter six will be just as good, if not better, because this is a crucial point in the story.

(Note: This is the first of three chapters following this one night.)

Review review review if you please :D

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Five

_Club Night_

Carly Shay. Now where do I begin.

First crushes aren't supposed to be melodramatic—they're supposed to be special in their own ways. I'm pretty sure that I was in love with Carly at some point, but that faded to friendship by our Junior year in High School. It was special, it was sweet, and she indulged me just enough. She was my friend. She'd blush when I made dorky comments about how much I liked her. But it ended there. And, as the years went on, I became her rock. We kept each other grounded and we were familiar, safe faces when craziness and drama got in the way.

iCarly was our baby.

I'd go on and say something about Sam right about now—about how she was always a wildcard. About how she was something of the crazy, overactive aunt we shared our baby with. About how that maybe, just maybe, if she wasn't in the picture with her constant cracks and comments about my "love" for Carly, something would've happened between the two of us. Carly Shay and I would've finally gotten a love story.

That's not to say I had feelings for Sam—not in High School, at least. It seemed criminal to think of her like that.

But Carly Shay.

XXX

Aztec was awfully quiet and demure for a club, and I couldn't say I was surprised. Loud ragers weren't Tyler's taste. Like him, he liked everything to be more laid-back. Nobody looked crazy drunk—eligible bachelors hit on girls at the bar, and groups sat down at tables, calling over waiters for another round of shots as they talked and laughed and kicked back for their Saturday night. There were maybe three people on the dance floor.

This was _definitely _Tyler's kind of place.

Carly must not've gotten the memo.

"You_ do_ know I can see your thong," I said, trying to make it sound casual.

Carly gave me a look. "The dress is too short?"

I surveyed her. The number she was wearing was a bandaged, red dress that could've grown legs and walked off an episode of _Jersey Shore._

"You'll pick up _plenty_ of guys in that outfit," I muttered as she walked away, already bored with our conversation and making a beeline for Sam and Tyler. I rolled my eyes. Typical. When I was with Sam and Tyler, I didn't feel like a third wheel, but whenever Carly joined us, I usually spent the night doing my own thing. Not that I cared, but it wasn't a habit I expected from Carly.

_Whatever,_ I figured, sitting down out the bar and grabbing a barista's attention.

It was going to be a long night.

One drink easily becomes two, three sounds innocent enough, and it isn't until the fourth that I usually get a fuzzy feeling in my head telling me, _slow down, Freddie, we need time to process all of this alcohol. _Heavy drinking was something I'd quit about a year ago—it took an almost-trip to the emergency room and a lecture from Sam, of all tell people, telling me to slow down on the liquor. But nights like these were the nights I'd usually drink myself to the point I knew I wouldn't be able to remember anything the next morning, because quite frankly, all I'd remember being sober was being alone at a bar when I was supposed to be out with my friends.

But for some reason, on that night, I stopped myself. Call it instinct or call it ESP, but of the one in a million chance I wouldn't get blacked out that night, I took it. And later, I'd be very glad I did.

My elicit activities didn't end after three rounds of vodka though.

"You look familiar."

I looked up, letting a smile grow when I saw myself facing a woman who took the stool next to me—make that a women wearing clothing that was a little too revealing.

Jackpot.

"Sadly, I can't say the same about you." I wasn't slick, by any means, but on a night where I knew I wasn't going to have much fun otherwise, I might as well. "What's your name?"

"Alessandra Weisz." The way it rolled off her tongue made my heart race. She narrowed her eyes on me. "And you're Freddie Benson."

I was going to ask her how she knew, but the answer came to me quickly. "You watch iCarly," I said.

She shrugged. "Yeah, I did when I was younger." She turned around, tossing her hair over her shoulder. "And, let me see . . . the fashion-forward one is Sam, and the one dressed like a hooker is Carly."

I took a minute to process that. Five years ago, that order would've been very backwards.

"Dressed like a hooker? 'Scuse me, Alia, but you're not one to talk."

"Alessandra," she corrected. "And being two weeks single calls for less conservative dressing, don't you think?"

It clicked in my head then. Back in High School, I may have been booksmart, but now, I was well versed in the language of women. Well—the language of hookups, at least. Romance was a stretch. But I knew how to get a girl into bed. And this blondie, Alessandra, was definitely looking for some distraction sex. Who better to give it than someone who was probably her celebrity crush as a tween?

Normally, I would just go for it, but I gave myself another minute before I pursued the chase. My morals needed some work during those four years, certainly, but sex with a girl who'd recently gone through a breakup wasn't a good sign.

"Two weeks? Ouch."

She gave a bitter laugh."Yeah, especially when you move three thousand miles for the bastard."

And then, looking into those blue eyes of hers, I suddenly had respect for Alessandra. Three thousand miles. Hmm. Doesn't that sound familiar.

"Jesus."

"Yeah," she sighed.

"So where are you from?"

"Originally, New York, but now I'm a Seattle citizen just like you."

Another smile.

She definitely wanted that sex.

"Well, he _is _bastard," I said. "Were you two together for a while?"

"No. That's probably the worst of it." She downed a round of vodka sitting in front of her. "I was warned millions of times, but for some reason, I couldn't stay away."

"Sorry?"

Probably thinking it to be drunken confusion, she didn't have an issue clarifying. "My family and friends. They told me not to leave. It was always, 'you've only known him for six months' this and that.'"

"That's a pain in the ass."

"Yeah, well." Another shot. Another smile. "But now I'm in a fine city, drinking my sorrows away with my favorite web celebrity."

And, like that, I smiled back, joining her in another round and deciding that this was a chase well worthwhile. Alessandra wasn't the kind of girl I usually went for—blonde haired and blue eyed, she wouldn't contribute to my race-diversity bucket list. I didn't like blondes, because half of them were plain, and the other half were sluts. But Alessandra didn't seem to fit into either of those categories. And her heart needed mending, so who else to help her but me?

"You have lipstick on your teeth."

I didn't have to turn back around to hear where the voice was coming from, because I already knew. And I knew it meant that my chase had been cut short.

Alessandra stopped laughing, and even blushed a bit. I didn't blame her—Sam had that affect over people.

I swerved my chair to face her, wanting nothing more in the world to be pissed at her, but most of my anger melted away once I saw the half-smirk, half-smile on Sam's face.

Taking a hint, Alessandra put her drink down and coolly said, "Really? Thanks for the memo. I'll go check." I felt something brush against my leg as she stood up from the bar, holding her head high and giving her best strut as she walked to the bathroom.

"Well, there's a girl that retains her dignity," Sam said, sliding onto the stool next to me. "What's happening to you, Freddie? Are you actually going for semi-decent girls?"

I rolled my eyes. Initial anger may have worn off, but I was a little pissed. "Well, then thank _God_ you stopped me."

"Please. You would've ruined her, I had to get that girl out of your clutches . . ." she paused, looking down at my lap. "Though it seems like that was a wasted effort," she said, holding up a business card with the name "Alessandra Weisz" printed in bright blue, along with a phone number, address and just about everything else you could imagine.

"When did that get there?" I said as I took it from her.

"Probably as she was getting up for her walk of shame."

"You know, I'd be much happier to talk to you if you didn't just rob me of a decent night."

"Oh, whatever." Her expression went stony for a second.

"Where's Carls?" I asked.

She shrugged. "Not sure. I think her and Tyler are playing pool or something."

She was trying hard to make it sound casual, and even though Sam was hard to read sometimes, I knew she hated having Carly spend club nights with us almost as much as I did. Carly and Tyler were super good friends (that's how him and Sam met), and being around both of them was overwhelming.

"So you decided to indulge your would-be-fucking-a-blondie friend?"

We both laughed at that. "What happened to you? You used to be such a dork."

"Eh. I still am."

"Then what's with the emotional wall?"

It was meant as a harmless comment, I'm sure, but on the rare occasion Sam and I got into these conversations, it dug up some stuff I'd rather keep buried.

"If there's anyone with an emotional wall, Sam, it's you."

She snorted. "Please."

"Being in a four year relationship isn't fooling anybody," I singsonged, wagging a bottle of beer. She snatched it from me, slamming it on the counter.

"You are _so _supportive."

"I try."

"I feel kind of bad though."

"Why?"

"That Alessandra chick had a nice rack."

She laughed as I shoved her, saying "You're a bigger perv than I am!"

Being with Sam like this was nice. We didn't get into deep, emotional discussions—quite frankly, none of us ever did anymore. We all had different ways of exerting our emotion. Me and Carly did it by fucking around. Sam . . . I wasn't entirely sure. Those most recent two years had been weird for her. She'd dropped old mannerisms we'd grown used to. For one, she stopped drinking entirely, which went without saying as a huge shock. She picked up some fashion tips out of the blue (though, granted, there was a definite sense of Sam-ness in what she wore, what with all of the denim and black hipster-y clothing I saw her in). That and it'd been years since we'd last gotten in a fight, which was definitely saying something. Sam and I fought a _lot_ at the start of those four years. I guess we both grew out of it.

But some stuff about her would always be the same. Because no matter how many years I knew her for or close I felt we were, I could never really decipher the girl with the wild blonde curls.

"I'll be right back, bathroom," she said, getting up.

"What, throwing up already?"

She rolled her eyes. "Very funny."

As I watched her walk away, nothing in the world could prepare me for what was about to come. All that was on my mind was how in god's name I'd put that fourth round of liquor I had in my hand back down on the table, because for some strange, otherworldly reason, I knew tonight wasn't a night to get drunk. How right I was.

Fleeting thoughts of Sam rushed through my head for only a couple of seconds, but they were things I'd never really thought of before. Whatever it was that her and Tyler saw in each other, it beat me. Tyler could've been the ultimate Casanova, but for some reason, he picked Sam. He picked a girl that could go hay-wire crazy when she wanted to with emotional baggage to boot. He didn't get himself wrapped up in Spencer like Carly, Sam and myself did, but he was a part of it. He saw how we suffered without him. He stuck around.

What the hell made him stay?

There was a loud bang_. _I turned my head to the direction of the bathroom, just in time to watch Sam come rushing out, slamming the bathroom door against the wall. I only caught her gaze for a fraction of a second, but what I saw made me realize something had gone very, very wrong. Her eyes were glassy and it looked like she was using all of the willpower she had to keep from crying. And, almost as quickly as we locked eyes, she looked away, picking up her walk to run.

"What happened?" I exclaimed.

As she bumped shoulders with me the only words I could catch were, "That bitch. That slutty little bitch."

Her voice breaking on the last word made me realize who she was talking about.

Carly.

"Carly," I breathed. My legs moved on their own accord as I lunged forward, making a beeline from the bathroom. This wasn't like Spencer. Those scary moments when Sam and I were running down the stairs to meet his dead body had flown by, neither of us being able to grasp the concept of what we were about to face. But this—this went by in slow motion, because I knew exactly what I was about to see. I knew what Sam and I had turned the blind eye to for so long. And I knew, in the back of my head, that this was something that would destroy her.

I broke into the bathroom facing exactly what I expected to see. They were on the countertop of the club's bathroom, and clothing was strewn all over the floor. There was Carly, with her legs open, her dress riding up and her bare breasts exposed. And then there was the guy she was kissing, with one hand on her chest in the other in between her legs, working in tandem all while ferociously kissing the girl I'd known since on was five. The one that lived across the hall from me. The one that was reaching with both hands to the clasp of his belt, desperately trying to undo it as she locked my gaze, giving me a look that I would never in my life forget. She was drunk as hell, I knew that. But there was no shame. No shame in the eyes of the girl I used to love. If anything, all I saw was a proud mischief that made me want to vomit, because we both knew what this meant.

The boy she was kissing was Tyler, and Sam had been betrayed by both of them.


	6. Leaving Home

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Six

_Leaving Home_

I was booksmart in High School. I didn't get girls, I didn't screw around, and I wasn't people-smart in the least. I couldn't have acted on instinct if my life depended on it, because I firmly believed that rational thought was the best way to solve any problem. But walking in on Carly while she was about to fuck Sam's boyfriend didn't call for any thinking. For the first time in my life, instinct came to me.

I ran out just in time to hear Tyler's voice behind me.

"Jesus. Freddie—"

I slammed the door, desperately running across the club. I needed to find her. I needed to find Sam before she went off and did something stupid. God knows how she felt.

And, just like that, I burst into the sticky July night. I frantically looked to my left and my right. "Sam?" I called. "Sam, where are you?"

And, like that, I saw her. Let the record show, Sam doesn't cry—I don't think I've ever seen her cry before in my life. Well, except for Spencer, but that was a special circumstance. She had walls, that girl. And tonight was the highest wall I'd ever seen. Because Sam Puckett—who'd been playing it cool and laid-back and relatively _normal_ for the past four years—immediately reverted back to the one I knew in High School. She was leaning against the wall, her back to me and her face hidden in the shadows.

I could've run. I could've walked away from all of this—Carly, Sam and Tyler—in an instant and never looked back. But I didn't.

"Sam—"

She jerked around, and for a split second, I saw terror on her face. She must've thought I was Tyler, because the minute she registered it was me, relief washed over. I expected to see puffy red eyes and a face full of run-down mascara, but instead there was a stony kind of half-shock in her expression that didn't surprise me at all. Because, this night and this incident—this was something we'd known all along, but never wanted to face.

I ran forward, taking her in my arms and holding her, knowing that if I hadn't done it then it never would've happened. All I felt in return was her limply hanging on to me, as if she was too woozy to do anything else. But that was enough. Because, without words, I told her what I needed to say.

_I'm right here. And I'm not leaving you._

"Freddie, please get me out of here."

"Are you okay?"

Damn. And I'd just been awarded dumbass of the year.

I decided to rephrase that. "Is there anything you want me to do? D'you want me to go in there and kick his ass . . . ?"

She pulled away, keeping her head down and daring not look me in the eye. "Give me your keys," she demanded, her voice shaky.

Robotically, I pulled them out, and she snatched them the minute she could, making a beeline for the car.

"Sam—"

She slammed the door.

There were a million things I could've done. I could've walked into the bar and ratted out Tyler and Carly, making them out to be fools and shaming them until I felt my work was done. I could've tried talking to Sam and eliciting emotion out of her, and I could've showed her that she had someone and that I could be her rock if that's what she needed. But something told me that this night wasn't about that. Sam wasn't in shock—she was upset. And an upset Sam was a potentially disastrous time-bomb.

I slid into the front seat, putting the keys in the ignition and starting up the car. Neither of us spoke. She rested her head against the window, staring out of it and into the night lights of Seattle. It was nights like these where the city was beautiful. These were the nights where she and Tyler would stay out until dawn the next morning. And that's when it struck me. For the days, weeks or months that would follow, Sam would feel like she didn't have anyone to spend these beautiful city nights with.

All she had was me.

"I'm sorry."

It was enough to make _me _want to cry, what with how I said it and how much of a mess we both were. I wouldn't be surprised if she swore me out right then and there. Because, Sam didn't get upset—she got angry first.

Silence.

I pulled over, stopping the car. She turned mildly away from the window, looking at the dashboard, knowing the conversation we were about to have.

"You tell me what you need to do, Sam, and I'll make it happen. I'll be your friend, but only if you want me to. If you want me to leave you alone—"

"No."

She locked eyes with me. We were so close in that small-ass car of mine, and all I could see was the pain of a girl who normally didn't show pain, who didn't show any emotion at all if she could help it. How as it that not ten minutes ago, we were joking around about Alessandra, the chick with a big rack at the bar? And now we were completely by ourselves.

We were alone.

"Tell me what you need," I said softly, "and I'll do it for you."

There was a pause.

"I want to go home."

"Then I'll take you home."

"Freddie, I don't have one anymore."

That's when it hit me. She was right. For the last four years, she'd been rooming with Carly.

She then quietly said, "Are you sure being my friend isn't too much to ask?"

I knew what she was asking. I knew exactly what she needed from me. And now I knew why, four years ago, she could throw her would-be life away so easily if it meant helping Carly. Because, quite honestly, it's that easy when you're doing it for someone you care about.

"There's no such thing as too much," I told her.

I saw a flicker of something in her eyes. Gratitude, surprise, sadness—I didn't know. It was gone in a second. But the words that followed couldn't have meant anything more in the world.

"Thank you."

XXX

Aztec was a good twenty minute drive from my apartment, and Sam passed out mere minutes after our riveting, emotionally charged conversation. _Good,_ I thought. _Maybe she'll wake up tomorrow and think it was a dream._

Stopping at the red lights, I'd turn and get a look at her. The girl liked to get her sleep, I knew that, but this time, she was practically comatose. She didn't snore or drool or anything like that—she just lay there with her brow furrowed, chewing on the inside of her lip.

I didn't know it then, but this was the first of many times I'd see Sam's sleeping face.

By the time we pulled up to my apartment building, I realized something important. My place was barely in any shape to accommodate myself, much less two people. It's not like any of her stuff was at my apartment—well, aside from the Fatcakes she stocked in my fridge as a "reserve supply." One of us would have to double back to her old apartment and pack some bags. But I didn't want to bring this up. Because, looking at Sam curled up on the front seat of my car and sleeping like a baby, it seemed too cruel to ask her to go back to the apartment she shared with her former best friend.

I took a deep breath. "Here goes nothing," I muttered, getting out of the car and opening the passenger door.

"Sam?" I whispered.

She blinked once, and that was the only reaction I got aside from a "hmm?"

"You're home."

It was hopeless. She barely stirred, and before I knew it, she was curled back up again and fast asleep. I sighed. Jesus. Waking her up and facing her wrath was the last thing I wanted.

"Here's my workout for the day," I said as I hoisted her up. I immediately felt the weight of a 120 pound girl as I staggered for a second.

Damn. I needed to go to the gym more often.

Carrying a full grown woman in your arms hurt like hell, but I didn't dare drop her, or drag her, or even let her sag lower an inch lower to the ground. I owed that much to her. And much as the weight was straining me, I didn't let myself suffer. Spencer dying and losing Carly as one of my best friends—_that _was worth suffering over. Carrying the weight of a girl I cared about was nothing.

I didn't even set her down as we took the elevator up.

My apartment was exactly like it was three hours ago. It was a mess, with last week's beer cans littering the countertops and clothing thrown around miscellaneously. The couch I'd been hanging out on before was clean, so I set her down there. I cleared the coffee table as much as I could, nursing the idea of wiping off the coffee stains but deciding against it. I had more important matters to attend to.

Jesus.

_More important matters to attend to._

There was no way in _hell_ I was letting Sam go back to her old apartment. Carly could be there, waiting to dangle her betrayal right over her friend's head until she dug into a weak spot. Pessimists say that the closer you are to someone, the more vulnerable you become. Because those few people that you trust your deepest secrets and most tender moments with, _those _are the people that know how to hurt you the most. And even though Sam had emotional walls that could get her through just about anything, I wasn't sure what would be waiting for her if she was thrown into Carly's firing range. I had to go back to the apartment myself, because as pissed as _I _was, whatever pain I was expecting was nothing compared to what Sam would've gone through.

And, besides—Sam was my top priority right now. I was all she had left.

XXX

A/N: I hope you guys enjoyed this! I had a lot of fun playing with Sam and Freddie's dynamic in this, and I can assure you that this is only the start. Hopefully I did the characters the justice they deserve—if they seemed a little OOC in the past few chapters, that wasn't a mistake, that's what I was going for. They should start to seem more like themselves from here on out. (Well . . . except for Carly. But, obviously, the bitch is damaged beyond repair.)

Thanks so much for reading! This was the second of three chapters following this one night in the story's timeline—the next chapter picks up right where this one left off.

Review!


	7. The First Night

6

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Seven

_The First Night_

Unlike the shabby slice of Seattle I owned, Sam and Carly's apartment was nice. Within a year of Spencer's death, Carly had already sold over Spencer's loft, along with most of his sculptures and paintings. The money was used to rebuild our iCarly studio at her new apartment uptown. That was probably one of the first red flags I saw that told me I was losing the girl I once knew. The old Carly never would've sold Spencer's work.

Jesus Christ. I snapped back reality. Carly. _Carly! _What the fuck was I going to do!

Needless to say, I had a slight panic attack en route to her apartment. Around Sam, I managed to keep my cool, but that was when everything was still so fresh and raw. I _needed_ to keep it together; if I freaked out, then what kind of position did that put _Sam _in? I was surprised the girl had to composure to leave the club without breaking something.

But, thank God, I was free of an emotionally tormented Sam for at least the next half hour. So now I had time to take care of myself.

"_Jesus!"_

I slammed my head against the wheel, and a loud _HONK _rang through the Seattle night. "What the fucking hell?" I seethed.

Carly. Perfect, innocent, beautiful Carly Shay. The girl that everyone admired and the one that'd once captured my heart. And for God knows how long, she'd been hooking up with the love of Sam's life.

Oh, this confirmed my worst and most obvious fears—I'd always known that Carly was up to something. I knew that the girl I'd spent so long loving had changed, and I knew that it started after Spencer's death. And as far as Tyler went, the signs were always there. The club nights. The hang-outs. The post iCarly dinners at his place. Carly setting him up with Sam.

Wait a second.

That's when I realized it.

"She never set them up," I said.

I'd been there when Tyler and Sam were introduced. We were lazying around the iCarly studio after a rehearsal. Then, in walked Tyler, and both him and Carly were flustered at first. It didn't seem it then, but looking back, he obviously wasn't anticipating that other people were going to be there. And, from the looks of it, she seemed just as surprised as he did.

_The two of them must've gotten their hookup wires crossed, _I thought bitterly.

He was turning around to leave, but Carly dragged him in, because me and Sam had already seen him. He was introduced to both of us, and that was when it started. Sam couldn't stop giving him the dreamy eye. And, from the looks of it, he enjoyed the attention.

After about ten minutes, he pulled her aside, far away enough from me and Carly but not enough to be out of earshot. "Hey, how about we go out sometime?"

If I wasn't so naïve, I wouldn't have mistaken Carly's suddenly flushed face for the warm weather. I wouldn't have taken her leaving the room so suddenly as a "bathroom break." And I most honest to God would've seen her and Tyler's "friendship" as what it really was—fuck buddies gone awry.

"All this time," I seethed.

How Carly and Tyler could lie like that and manage to sleep at night was beyond me, but somehow, the pulled it off. She was probably banking on the fact that Sam and I had been her friends for years, hoping that we wouldn't have expected her to be capable of something so bad and completely _selfish. _And she was right; that was the absolute best thing she could've done. Because the fact that this was a girl we'd known and loved for so long made us want to believe that our friend was still there, and that she was just as good and innocent as she remembered her.

Carly was the villain here. But our ignorance was also to blame.

And, as I pulled up in front of the Shay's apartment, my prayers for Carly to not be there vanished. Because, in that flash of a moment, I was so angry that I _wanted _her there. I want to see the look on her face as I swore her out and said every nasty thing I could that I'd kept bottled up for four years. This was my moment of revenge. No, this was more than that—this was my moment to be Sam's avenger.

"You better watch out, Carly," I muttered as I stepped out of the car, "Cause here I come."

XXX

And, to no surprise, the apartment was empty.

Sam kept a spare key at my place, so getting in wasn't an issue. I knew that my half hopes to bump into Carly wouldn't have been answered—she was out fucking Sam's boyfriend, whether it be at the club or at his place. I thought for a fearful moment that Carly might've figured out Sam was crashing at my apartment, and that she'd gone over there for the sake of being a rude bitch now that she'd finally been outed as one. I managed to put that to the back of my head, telling myself, _the faster you get this done, the faster you can get back to Sam, and the faster this night will be over._

Just like I had a key to Sam's place, she and Carly had a key to mine. I already knew that finding it was important, but decided to save that for last. That key could be _anywhere _in this apartment—or, even worse, dangling on Carly's keychain—and I needed to get out of there ASAP. Carly coming home to find me in her apartment was the least of my problems. I was worried about Sam.

I ran into her room, which you can only imagine as being the biggest disaster known to man. Grabbing the duffel bag in the corner, I started packing what I could into it—clothing, underwear, books, makeup, shower gel, fatcakes, a baseball bat—with absolutely no rhyme or reason, the only thought running through my head was the fear that Carly would burst into my apartment and cause Sam to subconsciously throw herself out a window. I didn't take the girl to be suicidal, but on a night like tonight, you could never be too cautious. Leaving her alone was dangerous enough as it was.

I ran from her room across the hall and into the bathroom, practically tearing the shower curtain down as I scrambled for just about anything I could get my hands on. It was just as I slammed one of the drawers shut that I heard the door open. I almost dropped the bag, I must've jumped about ten feet. I waited for a second, waiting to hear a second set of footsteps, and breathing the biggest exhale of relief when I only heard one.

Carly had come home alone.

I stepped out the bathroom, and as I looked into the next room, I saw Carly curled up on the couch, nursing _another _beer as she mindlessly flipped on an episode of _How I Met Your Mother. _And, for some reason, the sight of all of this pissed me off so much I couldn't hold my tongue.

"So, you two already got it in?"

She jumped a little, and then sighed. "I figured you'd be here."

Her voice sounded croaky, almost as if she was hungover.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" I meant for that to be a shout, and exclamation, but it came out with an exasperation I wanted to omit. "How the fuck can you just _sit there?"_

And, finally, she turned around to face me, her drunken gaze oddly piercing. "The same way I can fuck Tyler. Freddie, I don't _care."_

There were no words for this. There were no words I could get out that would say what I wanted to, because all I could think of was how tight my skin felt and how much my head was throbbing and how badly I was sweating, because the only other time I'd been this angry in my entire life was when Sam fucked up my bike ten years ago.

"Yeah, you didn't just fuck Tyler tonight," I fumed, keeping my fists balled tightly at my side. I didn't want to punch her. I didn't want to punch her. Punching her would lead to serious repercussions. _Freddie, you better not punch her. _"You fucked over everything, that's what you did. Sam has exactly _three people_ she's close to in her life, and even _that _didn't stop you and Tyler from fucking around."

"Jesus, why should it?"

"_She's your best fucking friend!" _

And now I was bellowing.

_"She's the only fucking friend you have in this ENTIRE world! _And you've lost her, Carly, you've lost both of us."

"This doesn't have anything to do with you."

I unballed my fists, finally, because I realized I wasn't going to punch her. I wouldn't do that—even though Sam would've liked it, I'd never thrown a punch before in my life. And I wasn't going to start tonight.

I threw my hands up. "This has _everything _to do with me! I'm all she has left, and it's all because of you—"

"Give it a rest, Freddie," Carly snapped. She was massaging her temples, treating me as if I was an annoying pest that wouldn't go away. "She didn't lose me, okay? I've been fucking her boyfriend—yeah, big deal. Shit happens. But she needs me as much as I need her. She won't leave, because she's too afraid of being alone. And I know I won't lose you either, because you can't deal without having her in your life. So quit your goddamn screaming and bring her home."

They say that an argument with a crazy person is an argument you'll never win, because no matter what you say, they'll always believe they're right. And now I saw Carly's logic—I saw why she'd been able to become such a monster over the past four years. We'd given up our college lives to be there for her, and she believed that we depended on her as much as she did on us, and that we wouldn't leave her no matter what happened or what she did. But she was wrong. She was weak and powerless and she drew her strength from other people—Sam didn't do that. Sam made her own strength. And being around Sam gave me strength.

As long as we had each other, the two of us would be okay.

And this, this sudden realization, made me "quit my goddamn screaming" and finally say something I'd kept inside of me for four years, something that was sweeter than any revenge I'd ever get, something I'd say in a voice so level with such a smile on my face that I would never forget it.

"Well, Carly, you want to know what I think?" I said. "I think you're a slutty-ass _bitch_. And you're going to spend the rest of your life hating yourself more than Sam and I _ever _will."

Silence was all that followed. Oh, dear God in heaven, that felt so good finally coming out of my mouth. I gave Carly two points for trying to maintain her composure, but it was clear that she was just as floored as I was. Never in my _life_ had I ever said something like that to anyone, much less her. And the look on her face was absolutely priceless.

I left the apartment after that, letting my words hang in the air for a few seconds first. And then, when I shut the door, I heard a sound so muffled that I almost thought I missed it. But, once I pressed my ear against the door, I knew exactly what it was.

I'd reduced Carly Shay to tears. And she deserved every single one of them.

XXX

On the drive back to my apartment, I thought about what would happen next. Sam's duffle bag was in the passenger seat, and all I could think of was the irony of it all. Sweet, demure, innocent Carly Shay was the villain for once. And Sam—the girl who'd tormented me for years on end—was the same girl I was trying so hard to protect. The question of "why" didn't even occur to me that night, because I still a little buzzed from the club.

Besides, I'd have plenty of years to think of that question later.

I walked in through the door, half expecting to hear sobs from the bathroom and to see emptied pints of ice cream littered on the floor. But it was exactly as I'd left it—Sam was passed out on the couch, curled up in a ball, the only light in the room filtering from an open window. I kicked off my shoes, suddenly aware of just how fucking _exhausted _I was. Jesus. I looked at the clock.

Three AM.

"Fuck that," I muttered, rubbing my neck. Three AM wasn't even that late, but the problem was that I had to be up for an iCarly rehearsal in four hours—

Wait a second.

"Shit," I exclaimed, a little too loudly. I covered my mouth, and fleeting thoughts of iCarly ran through my head. What in God's name was I going to do? It'd been my only source of income since I was eighteen. Scratch that—_our_ only source of income. And it's not like Sam and I could be a part of iCarly anymore . . .

I'd have to time to think of this later, though, because right now, Sam was stirring on the couch.

"Freddie?"

She sounded groggy. I walked over to the foot of the couch at sat down next to her. "Hey. Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you up," I whispered.

"Ugh." Her eyes only half open, she turned from side to side. "What time is it?"

"Late." She didn't respond for a second. "You should go back to sleep."

"I'm at your place?"

_Crap._ "Yeah. It's been a long day."

There was a short pause, and I could tell that all of the memories from tonight were rushing back to her.

"Ohh." She put her head back down, closing her eyes and not saying anything. I sighed. We'd talk about this god-awful day in the morning. Or tomorrow night. Or . . . eventually. There didn't have to be any rush, because as far as I knew, neither of us were going anywhere.

How right I was.

"Jesus, you must be freezing," I said. There wasn't a whole lot of fabric on Sam's body to give her warmth. I walked over to the window and shut it, then grabbed a blanket from my room. I draped it over her. "D'you need anything? Tea, a fatcake?"

She gave me a smile. "No, but I'll let you know if do." She yawned. "Now, shuddup and let me go to sleep."

"Sure." I reached for the duffle bag on the coffee table. "Oh, and I brought some of your stuff back for you. It'll be here in the morning."

As I got up and started walking for my room, she said in a voice so soft I could've easily missed it, "You did that for me?" She smiled, and her voice sounded faraway and dreamy. "Hmm. My hero,"

I snapped back, turning to face her, but all I was facing was a girl that'd completely passed out after calling me her "hero." She'd probably been half asleep and half delirious when she'd said it, and I doubt she'd remember a word of this conversation in the morning.

But, then again, that didn't matter. Because, as I shut the door behind me and climbed into bed, those kept playing over and over again in my head. Call me crazy and call me sentimental, but it'd been a long night. And hearing something nice from a girl that used to hate me made me wonder exactly what I was in for in the days to come.

I never would've thought that those days would become weeks, months and years.

"My hero," I muttered, just as I fell asleep on the first night of a new chapter in my life—a chapter called "Sam."

A/N: So over half of this fic has so far been centered around this one night (7.8K words, for those of you that were curious), and I hope I got my point across. This was such a joy to write, and I can't stress just how crucial this point of the story is. This concludes the first part it, as we now move on to part numero dos.

(Aka, the relationship-building stage. Muhahahah.)

Feedback, reviews and comments are appreciated~

Side-note: Bonus points if you can guess which reality TV star said Freddie's kick-ass one-liner.


	8. Day One

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Eight

_Day One_

"So much for that presentation, Fred."

I blinked. Dear God in heaven. _Time to go back to reality, Freddie. _

My vision swam as I returned to life, back to the coffee shop where I went to pick up my cappuccinos in the morning. I made sense of the fleshy-toned shapes that were Emma as I reminded myself, _you're thirty five years old. That was twelve years ago. Snap out of your goddamn daydreams for one minute and give the nice barista some attention._

Composing myself, I turned to her and said, "That? Oh, I was just going to pitch some ideas today. Nothing big."

She laughed. "So playing hooky is your alternative?"

"Yeah. Call me Ferris."

And then we both broke into laughter, which was a relief since I was practically drowning in my own pool of sweat. These memories I was reliving . . . I'd never let them back in before. Ever. Sometimes, they'd haunt me in my dreams, but when I was conscious and had the choice to keep them out, I did. The bad memories were bad memories, and that night was only the tip of the iceberg. Trying to forget them was a defense mechanism. But the good memories? I lived in those. I lived in those kisses and smiles and laughter, because that was my life and it always would be, even if it didn't exist anymore.

But reliving "Sam" wasn't a gift. It was a chore. Because even the good plagued me, since all it did was remind me how much I screwed up and how bad things got by the time it was over.

_Stop getting ahead of yourself._

Have you ever read the last page of a book just so you could know how it would end? That's what I felt like doing. I figured, if I was going to relive this entire, heinous experience, why not just flip to the last page and get the worst of it over with? It'd save a lot suffering, that's for sure. I wouldn't have to remember how hard I fell for her and how much I cared about her, because it would only remind me how I was too late.

Instead, I thought, _No._ _I'm doing this. I'm remembering the entire thing, no matter how ugly it gets. _

"Hey, Emma?" I practically croaked.

She turned over to me. "What's up?"

"I have to ask a favor from you."

"Sure."

I cleared my throat. "Could you . . . make sure that I don't leave this chair until the day is over?" The look on her face made it obvious that she needed some clarification. "Personal stuff," I said quickly. "Call it a trip down memory lane."

She cracked a smile. "Well, my shift ends at four, but I'll babysit you until then."

"Got it. Thanks."

She paused before saying, "Are you reliving the iCarly days?"

My heart skipped a beat. _Shit. How the hell could she know about Sam?_

She said, "You guys ended the show so abruptly, I figured you must miss it and that thinking about it would require some caffeine and a day off."

I breathed a sigh of relief. Of _course _she didn't know about Sam. She'd probably been an iCarly viewer too. It's not like we'd ever talked about iCarly before, but I didn't look any different than I had ten years ago. Recognizing me would've been a cinch for any former iCarly viewer. If anything, I'd been in just about the same physical shape since high school. No, scratch that—it goes beyond just that. Because I tried to keep myself looking _exactly the same._ Down to the haircut, the brand of watch I wore, and the cologne I dabbed on my neck every morning. Yeah, so maybe it was a little weird, and maybe I'd been denying it for some time, but I knew what my intentions were.

If Sam and I bumped into each other on the street one day, I'd want her to recognize me.

I turned back to Emma. "Something like that," I managed.

She gave me a nod and didn't press any further. _This is why I like you,_ I thought.

I hoped the God that I'd somehow have the resolve to stay in that chair past four PM, because I knew what diving headfirst into this story meant. The farther I got, the more painful it became. The beginning was just that—a beginning. Looking back, I'd take a dozen Tylers and a thousand Gibbys over what I'd eventually have to face.

And, even with this thought in mind, I can't help but smile and breathe a sigh of relief, because this part of the story is my favorite. After Tyler and Carly were out of our lives, things got better. Maybe not at first, but they did. Sam and I grew closer. The story of us isn't completely void of happiness—because, for a stretch of time, we were as happy as two people could be. And it was all because we had each other.

"Sam Puckett," I muttered. "Whoever would've guessed . . ."

XXX

I vividly remember that first morning, because it was cool and humid and I was sweating so much that my shirt clung to my body. I expected Sam to sleep through the entire day, but about halfway through making breakfast that morning, she woke up.

"Ahh, shit, please don't tell me any of last night was real," were the first words that came out of her mouth.

"And she lives," I said. I flipped the pancake over in the frying pan. "I was wondering when you'd come around. I don't think I've seen you out for this long since your drinking days."

I knew that a scowl on her face was all it would take to lighten the mood. I laughed. Yeah, so maybe our lives were fucked up, but I wasn't going to tune out like I did after Spencer. Maybe Sam wouldn't want to handle it with laughter, but I promised myself that's how I would go about it. Because, quite honestly, however I handled things, Sam would handle them ten times worse. I had an example to set.

"Yeah, well, I kind of wish I'd been drinking." She didn't have to finish her sentence, because I knew what she was thinking. _Maybe I would've blacked out and wouldn't remember any of it._

I opened my mouth to start in on the lecture I'd been rehearsing all morning, but decided not to. "They say pancakes and bacon are the perfect remedies for hangovers, you know," I said.

She offered me a smile. It was a small one, but it was there.

She got up, walking over and sitting on a stool at the counter. "Bacon? Damn."

"I wouldn't get too used to this if I were you, most mornings I'm more of a cereal kind of guy."

"Pfft. Then I have some work to do here."

She dug in, shoveling the food in her mouth. It was all harmless small talk from there, but even then, I couldn't shake the weirdness of it all. For once, Sam was acting like . . . Sam. She wasn't being dreamy eyed girl I saw around Tyler, and she kept the perverse cracks to herself. No, instead she was exercising the same sarcastically degrading humor I'd grown used to in High School. And, for the past four years, I was the only person she'd share that side of her with.

And, in typical Sam fashion, she avoided the topic of Carly completely and totally.

"Listen," I said as we were cleaning up, "We were supposed to have an iCarly rehearsal this morning."

"I know. I remember what our schedule was."

_Was._ She said it simply, but even then, it sounded so final.

"Well," I said, "Rent costs about sixteen hundred a month, and assuming we want to eat anytime soon . . ."

She rolled her eyes. "Yeah, yeah, I get it. We're fucked until we find a job."

And, suddenly, I was resentful, flashing back to Carly and MIT and everything I gave up for her. "Considering how great our resumes look, I'm sure that won't be a problem," I muttered sarcastically.

It was meant as a snide comment, but Sam put down the plate she washing and looked me right in the eye. "Sixteen hundred between the two of us isn't too steep."

"I guess. Not for the first few months, anyway."

Sam's cheeks went pink, and she turned away, interested in her plate again and scrubbing at it. "Well, you've got the brains, you come up with the gameplan."

Clearly, the idea of living with me for a few months was a difficult concept for her to grasp. Not that I blamed her, since let's be honest—Sam and I used to fight a lot. Correction, we used to fight _all day every day_. That was in Middle School when we were younger and less mature, but rooming together would present plenty of opportunities to rekindle our bitching. And, right now, the idea of that wasn't something we could afford—not when all we had was each other.

_One problem at a time, Freddie, _I told myself.

"First thing's first," I said. "I don't understand how your back hasn't given out yet, because that couch is lumpy as fuck."

And, before I could suggest anything else, we were both reeling in a fit of laughter.

"Maybe we should get an air mattress or something," I finally managed.

"Yeah, I'm not going to lie, that couch was pretty uncomfortable."

She stopped laughing after that, and looked at me with searching eyes. Her makeup from last night was smudged all over her face, and she was still wearing the skimpy black dress. "Are you sure you want to take me in, Freddie?" she asked.

Taken aback, I replied, "Well, it's not like I was really given a choice."

"What does that mean?"

Jesus. How was I supposed to explain this?

"D'you remember how when Spencer died, Carly asked you and me to stay here with her?" I said.

I saw a flicker of something in Sam's eyes, but it was gone before I could think about it too much. "Vaguely. Why?"

"Well, I always kind of wondered how you were able to drop everything and be there for her."

Her jaw contorted as she spat out, "Well—you did the same thing—"

"But it wasn't easy. I was barely able to tell her yes, but you could say it without blinking."

"Freddie, listen—"

"And, no offense intended, but I told myself it was because you didn't have as much going on for the next few years, and I had a lot on the line." Sam shut her mouth. "You know, MIT was really, really hard for me to give up."

And I stopped talking then and there. Because now that I saw Carly for who she really was and I saw who I'd given my dream up for, thinking about my college dream made me sick.

"What's your point?" was all Sam could say.

"My point," I said, "Is now I understand how you did it." She looked at me, confused. "When you really care about someone," I explained, "it doesn't matter what you have on the line, because helping them is always the easiest thing."

She took a minute to let the words register in her head, and I did too. Because it wasn't until they came out of my mouth that I realized what I'd just said. _When you really care about someone. _Is that really how I felt about Sam? Of course I cared about her, she was my best friend—but I never realized that I cared about her to the same degree that I cared about Carly in High School. Fuck, I cared about her even _more_ than I had for Carly in High School. Isn't that what I'd just said? How giving my life up for Carly was a challenge, but doing the same thing for Sam was easy?

It was enough to make my head spin.

"You know, I'd appreciate this sentimental crap a whole lot more if you weren't in danger of burning to death," she said to me.

"What d'you mean?"

"You forgot to turn off the stove."

And, like that, I jumped ten feet, because I hadn't noticed the open flame my thumb was getting close to. A combination of my shrieks and flailing broke the spell, and before I could think about any of what I'd just said, I was laughing so hard my stomach hurt, and so was Sam. We were on the floor in mere seconds, cracking up like a bunch of ten year olds until we got to that point where we couldn't laugh any more.

"Oh, shit," I managed. "This day's been weird as hell."

"So far." She was still giggling. "It could get weirder, you know."

"Yeah, between the two of us, it definitely could."

And that's how things left off. I don't remember much else from that day, only that Sam curled up in front of the TV and dozed off here and there. She was like that for a few days afterward, too. But my head never stopped spinning after that first day. That was the conversation that planted the first dose of confusion in my head, and I could've never fathomed how much I'd have in store for me.

What I could fathom was this: I was in for one hell of a ride.

A/N: Hope you guys enjoyed this little chappie—nothing too special going on here, but the relationship will pick up really soon. Happy Easter and Passover to those of you that celebrate it.

Blessings,

Vikki


	9. Changes

5

A/N: Jesus, this is late. This is really, _really _late. I'm sorry I've been MIA for the past three weeks—I had some personal stuff to deal with alongside my usual mayhem, so writing kind of fell by the wayside. But, alas, Spring break is upon me! Expect another update sometime before Sunday, and for those of you that are rabid Hunger Games fans like I am, I've written a plethora of one-shots in regards to that fandom. Check 'em out if you have the minute

Blessings,

Vikki

_Reach for Something that's Already Gone_

Chapter Nine

_Changes_

I told myself I would give Sam one week to mope around and be as much of a wreck as she wanted to. Understandably, she was in a bad mood, but at the very least she didn't attack me as a way of exerting it. So going into that week, I decided I would let her sit around and sleep and watch TV and eat all day if that's what she wanted to do, but after a week, I'd literally pick her up and drag her out of the apartment if that's what it took. Yeah, she was upset, and I understood that—I'd feel pretty shitty too if I found out my boyfriend of four years was cheating on me with my best friend. But the two of us were jobless and on a fast-track to being broke. I couldn't pull all of the weight, and more importantly, I couldn't live with a zombie.

She moped around for exactly two days. On the third day, I woke up late that morning to the sound of Sam blow drying her hair in the bathroom. I squinted, getting a good look at her. Instead of pajamas, she was wearing slacks and a nice shirt, and she'd made an effort to put on makeup.

"Jesus. What're you doing up so early?" I muttered.

"Hey, morning." She was scrambling around the bathroom, putting her earrings in. "I'm running kind of late, but I have an interview in fifteen minutes."

"For a job?"

"No, a documentary," she retorted, rolling her eyes. "Yes, a job."

"I was wondering when you'd finally—"

"Save the bullshit for later, please, because I made you breakfast. You should be nice to me."

Huh. That was a surprise.

"Breakfast? Really?"

"Yup. Don't love me too much."

"Well, I'd thank you if you weren't being sarcastic."

She was practically running around the apartment now, throwing things in her bag at random and barely taking a minute to check her reflection in the mirror one last time. "Does this say 'waitress' to you?" she asked.

"Well, you're not in pajamas, so yeah, it does."

"Oh, shut up." She threw me a glance over her shoulder as she walked out the door, saying, "I'll be back soon."

And as the door slammed behind me, I was shaken by the weirdness and general shock of it all. Sam was out of bed. _Sam was out of bed. _And, better yet—she was out of bed and on her way to a _job interview!_ A smile stretched across my face as I let out a "Yes!" jumping out from under the covers as I made my way into the kitchen. I ate the pancakes she'd made heartily that morning, because this goes beyond anything I could've hoped for. I'd been expecting the worst—I'd been expecting a girl that'd be more of a burden than helpful, and instead, I got the good end of the "Sam" stick.

This went on for a few days, and in the back of my head, I'd wonder when my luck would run out and when she'd give up. But she never did. I'd wake up every morning, and she'd be in the bathroom, combing her hair and getting ready for the day, turning to give me only a few "I'm late, sorry, be back soon," passing words as she walked out the door and to her next job interview for God knows what.

But I noticed other things, too. She'd worn her hair pin straight for a few years, and it only took a week before the flat-iron was buried in the depths of her drawer, her blonde curls back up in its signature ponytail. She reverted back to ratty jeans and flannel shirts when she got home from her interviews, plopping down in front of the TV with a fat cake and sitting through a good five episodes of girly cow before she had to get up to pee.

Oh, holy shit, the entire thing was just so _weird._

"I'd like to have the name of the person that abducted you for the past four years," I said one day. This was about a month after the club incident.

"What d'you mean?"

"I haven't seen you like this in years."

She shrugged. Another fatcake found its way into her mouth. "Yeah, well, I had a mourning friend to deal with. Don't-give-a-fuck attitudes aren't usually the best remedy for that."

"I guess." I paused before muttering, "Her too." Now Sam turned away from her TV, resting her chin on the couch. "She just got so—"

"I know. You don't need to say it."

'Different' was the word I was thinking of. In truth, there wasn't much of anything left in Carly that I knew her to be. It was hard to believe sometimes that Spencer was the only catalyst to this.

"D'you think we let it happen?" I asked. "Carly, I mean. There was probably something else we could've done."

"Freddie, I don't want to talk about this."

"I just feel like we didn't pay enough attention, and that maybe if we had—"

"_Freddie,"_ she snapped. "Get over it. Yeah, it's shocking as hell, but if I've moved on then so can you." She thought for a second before adding, "It's not like you're the one she fucked over."

_Ouch._ And there she went, saying something spiteful. I turned to scold her, but then I remembered, _this is Sam you're talking to. This isn't Tyler's zombie girlfriend anymore. She's her again._

"You know, I really hated your guys' relationship," I said.

She scowled. "Jealous much?"

_No,_ I wanted to exclaim, but I managed to stop myself. There wasn't much truth in that. "_I _don't think it was ever really meant to be—say what you want, but he always seemed too grounded for you."

I wondered if I was crossing the line, and the look on her face told me I just had. "D'you really want to start with me right now?"

"It's true."

"Are you suggesting I can't be grounded?"

"No, but when you are it's _fake."_

My voice was rising, and that's when I knew that I had to mellow things out. Sam was starting to look absolutely murderous, and now that we were having this conversation, I couldn't remember my reason for starting it.

_It's because she said something rude, and you're fighting back._

"All I'm saying," I said, trying to keep my voice level, "is that it's okay to not be the most grounded person in the world. You of all people should know that—you used to _live_ by that. And you were the one person I expected to never put up with any of Carly's bullshit."

She didn't have anything to say to that. I could tell she wanted to, but nothing ever came out of her mouth. The old Sam would've completely gone off on me—she would've shouted some profanities and thrown some punches and gone on a rampage before she was done. But even though I wasn't dealing with weirdly-calm girlfriend Sam, she still wasn't the girl I knew in High School. Ratty jeans or not, it would take some time before I would get the girl with the blonde curls back.

Our conversation ending there was proof of that. Not only did she put up with what I'd said, she changed the topic completely.

"Freddie, I got the job."

I spun around and faced her, and the expression she was giving me was emotionless.

"Well. I'd say congratulations, but you don't look too happy."

"Yeah, I was meaning to tell you before you went off about my ex relationship," she snapped.

I groaned. Perfect. Now I'd have to apologize. I turned to her, and her blank glare had turned into a smirk. That's when I knew. _She's not really mad at me. _

"How can I make it up to you?" I asked.

"I kind of wanted to celebrate."

"I'd say we go down to Larry's and get drinks, but since you don't drink—"

"No," she interjected. "Let's do that."

"For real?"

"Yeah." She got up, "I'm missing alcohol right now."

I stared at her in shock as she got up and grabbed her jacket, slung her bag over her shoulder and was about to walk out into the Seattle night in sweatpants and girly-cow t-shirt.

"What, you're giving up being two years sober so you can take celebrations shots with me?"

"Do me a favor, Freddie," she said as she opened the door, "And just go with it. I'm going to get wasted with you tonight, no questions asked. Got it?"

Now, if I'd had any self decency and sense of a moral code at that point, I would've stopped her and locked her in my room for the entire night, and I would've dealt with whatever wrath I had to from her the next day. I'd been close to Sam during her drinking days, and by the end of it, it'd gotten _bad. _But the thing was, I was too goddamn _relieved _she hadn't bit my head off for going off on Tyler.

"I'm going to regret this," I muttered as I grabbed my wallet and jacket.

Usually I know when I'm making a stupid decision. The second I walked out of that door, I thought this night would end badly.

Even to this day, I couldn't tell you if this bar night ended for the better or worse, because it was the start of _everything. _

XXX

A/N: Ugh, I'm sorry. You guys waited three weeks for a short, filler-y mess. I promise the next chapter will be at least twice as long as this and twice as action packed.

And, I know this is about fifty two reviews overdue, but thank you so much to my wonderful reviewers. You guys keep me going, every single one of you—feedback means the world to me and I'm so grateful for those of you that take the time out of your day to say something about my work.

Blessings,

Vikki

PS. Shameless plugs to my Hunger Games fanficitons:

Peeta/Katniss: _Words Not Spoken_

Cato/Glimmer: _The Other Games_

Cato/Clove:_ A Drug for Angels_

Rue/Thresh: _Little Girl, Gentle Giant_

Finnick/Johanna: _Dangerous Waters_


	10. Drunk

A/N: I know, this is late again. And I'm sorry—I really am. But I think I made up for it with a longer than usual/more action than usual/more character building than usual chapter. Because I really, _really _like how this turned out. So dig in and enjoy as I continue to delve into the relationship building. Muhahahah.

Blessings,

Vikki

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Ten

_Drunk_

_ Larry's_ was a bar across the street from my apartment back when I lived in Seattle. During my hard drinking days, I'd go four or five rounds a night there and even black out on occasion. The manager found it hysterical that I was a child web celebrity drinking himself into misery, so every night when I'd show up, he'd walk through the door and say, "Well, if it isn't steady Freddie." We called him big Larry, and as the name suggests, he was an overweight bartender with a booming laugh and a crazy sense of humor. He'd moved to Seattle from San Fran a few years back, opened up his bar, and as I far as I was concerned, the rest was history. Sam and I were his favorites and regulars over the years, but we eventually stopped going once Sam stopped drinking. Even though it was right across the street, I could've popped on over whenever I wanted to, but it didn't feel right. Larry's was more than a good-time bar—it was our refuge from Carly. Going without Sam was unthinkable.

We walked in early that night. It'd been two years since we'd last been there, but we barely had to take a few steps in the door before Larry was out of the kitchen, shuffling towards us with his signature grin slapped on his face.

Typical Larry.

"Puckett, Benson!" He barreled over, clapping me on the back and giving Sam a sloppy kiss on the cheek as if it was only yesterday when we'd last seen him. "It's good to see the both of ya's!"

"Back at you, Larry."

"What brings you back? I was beginning to wonder when I'd see my two favorite celebrities again."

"Sam got her first real job," I said.

Sam blushed the smallest bit, shoving me off. "Hey, I've had jobs before, give me more credit you dipshit."

Larry burst into laughter. "Commercial America, eh? Didn't know that's how you iCarly types were!"

_Oh shit,_ I was thinking, because when Larry opened his mouth next, I knew what was coming. "How's your boyfriend, Puckett? What's his name—Taylor?"

"Tyler," she corrected him. I groaned. Larry was tactless, he didn't know what he was potentially getting himself into. But to Sam's credit, she kept it together. "We broke up," she said simply.

"Oh!" His eyes moved back and forth between the two of us, and a smirk crept on his face. "So, are you two . . .?"

"What?"

"Oh, no!"

_"Him_? Fuck no!"

"_Never_ . . ."

We both scrambled like that for a few minutes before realizing we sounded like fourth graders.

Of course, Larry was in hysterics, completely beside himself. "Alright, alright, there's no need to take me so seriously." He turned away from us and walked behind the bar, already popping open two cans of beer. "This to start you off?"

"Ever heard of the rhyme 'beer before liquor, never been sicker,' Larry?" Sam snapped.

He chortled. "Looks like we've got feisty Puckett tonight," he said as he poured us two shots of whiskey. He gave me a wink. "Better watch out for this one, Steady Freddie."

With that, Larry left the bar, leaving us to the bartender as he manned the rest of his restaurant. I look to Sam, who was smiling at me.

"You're laughing at me."

"No I'm not," she said, in between short giggles.

I rolled my eyes, downing the first shot. The alcohol burned as it went down my throat. "Liar."

"Okay, so maybe a little." She leaned back in her chair, looking at the shot glass searchingly.

"Sam . . ."

"Hmm?"

"It's okay if you don't want to drink."

There was a flash of gratitude in her eyes. And then it was gone.

She snorted. "Who d'you think you are, my mother?"

She downed the whiskey in no time at all, waving over the bartender for another round.

"This is going to be interesting," I muttered as we took a shot together.

XXX

"Freddie?"

"Yeah?"

"You still there?"

"I guess . . ."

She giggled. "You sound funny."

"That's because I'm _drunk_."

"Ahh. Do I sound different?"

"Uh. I dunno." I took a good look at her, because being the drunk genius I was, there had to be some correlation between the look on her face and the sound coming out of her mouth. "You can't expect me to be…" I paused before I remembered the word, "Coherent."

And, like clockwork, the bartender was back with another shot.

"Too _much!"_ Sam whined after him once he was out of ear-shot. "No more alcohol! _I'm so fucking drunk."_

"You stopping?"

Normal snorts from Sam were usually dripping with sarcasm and paired with a glare. Drunken snorts from her were loud and paired with unnecessary laughter. "_No,"_ she drawled, pouring the liquid down her throat and suppressing a cough as she came up for air.

"Damn. You're just goin' all out tonight."

"Well, _duh._ You don't know how hard it is to go two years without this stuff."

Unlike Sam, I was a diligent drinker. I knew my all-time capacity—it took me three shots to get buzzed, five to get drunk, at around ten I started puking and by fifteen I was blacked out. (You could say I was something of a heavy-weight.) That and miraculously, I always kept track of how much liquor was going into my mouth. Sam, on the other hand, would just keep going and going until she was no longer conscious. And it was scary as hell sometimes, especially that one night two years before when she'd gotten her stomach pumped.

The bartender—being the dumbass he is—brought us over yet _another _round, and by that point, I knew Sam and I were sitting at drink number eight.

"Okay, no more," I said, grabbing the glass from her.

She pouted, "Why?"

"Because we've both had way too much to drink."

"Says who?"

"Says me." I looked at her. "C'mon, you trust me, right?"

And the response this question elicited meant that Sam was _definitely _drunk. "_Obviously._ What, d'you think I'm living under the same roof as you for the free food?" She threw her hands up. "Pfft! I'm choosy with who I share my space with!"

I didn't have much time to think about that, because at that exact moment, I caught Larry out of the corner of my eye. He gave me a wink, which was something of our signal for checking in way back in the day.

"Things going alright?" he asked when I walked over.

"Yeah. Can you keep an eye on her for a minute? I'm taking her home, I just need the bathroom."

"You better not get vomit on my floor, man, cause it was just cleaned," he said with a smile.

"Relax. I only need to take care of the regular bodily functions."

I clapped him on the shoulder, walking for the door. He called after me, "Hey, Benson?"

I turned back around to him.

"You're an awfully level-headed drunk."

I laughed. "It'll kick in later, believe me."

And then, on a completely unrelated topic, he lowered his voice and said, "You know, Freddie, you could do a lot worse than a girl with blonde curls."

Before I could even process what he'd said, he was walking away, laughing to himself as if I was the funniest fucking thing in the world.

XXX

Walking Sam out of the bar that night, this much was obvious—she was hammered, I was too. So hammered, in fact, that she made the very un-Sam decision of vehemently asking me if we could go to our old elementary school playground.

"But you _hate_ children. Why would you want to feel like one again?"

"Just because I hate other kids doesn't mean I don't want to _be _one!" she exclaimed. She threw her hands up and stumbled as she did. I held on to her, and she kept her balance

"I don't know if that's such a good idea . . ."

"Oh, stop being such a kill-joy."

"I'm not! I'm just trying to be responsible."

She laughed. "Mr. Responsible, getting drunk with his female roommate. What would Mama Benson have to say to that?"

That was enough to get me laughing with her. My mom was making plenty of attempts to stay in contact with me, and even though the close calls were numerous, she didn't know about my new living arrangement.

"Well, I hope you have a good sense of direction in the dark," I told her, "Cause I sure as hell don't know which way to go."

She gave me a smirk and took my hand, tugging at it. "D'you trust me?"

"I guess."

"Then I'll lead the way."

With that, she whisked me off into the midnight streets of Seattle, through winding alleys and behind loud bars. We passed young couples and other meandering drunkards as we made our way through parts of a city I never thought existed. I'd lived in Seattle my entire life; I thought I'd known the place like the back of my hand. I was used to the grayness and I was used to the city, but I realized that night that I was never really used to the _people._

Oh, the characters we passed last night. Granted, I never got more than a passing look at them, but every person I saw on the city's midnight streets was different. A homeless couple snoring on the side of one street, a beautiful, sobbing red-head crying her makeup off as she sat on the curb . . . I was amazed at how much I'd never seen before. I was _definitely _that sheltered kid.

But after about an hour of walking, it got old. I got tired. Hell, _Sam _got tired. Maybe she didn't show it, but I could tell from the bags under her eyes and her constant slipping-and-almost-falling-into-the-street maneuver. For reasons beyond me though, her legs never gave out. I wondered where the hell she'd gotten so much stamina from.

"Fuck, slow _down,"_ I whined. "My feet are killing me."

"_Ha!_ You sound like such a little bitch right now."

She turned around and I gave her a pout. I'm sure it was the most amusing thing in the world.

"Seriously, let's sit down soon. Please."

"Alright, I get it." She stopped, a pointed her finger to our left. "It's right there. We'll just cross the street . . ."

She doubled over in drunken laughter, bounding across the empty street and making a dash for the playground.

_"Sam!"_ I half whined/screamed after her. Jesus. The girl could sure as hell sprint, for someone that (last I checked) wasn't athletically inclined.

The swings would've been really haunting on other night, since they creaked and swung on their own without wind. But from my drunken perspective, the entire thing was all too poetic, and therefore fucking _hysterical. _This was one hell of a midnight excursion.

"I missed this!" she shouted as she pumped her legs, gaining height on the swings. I did the same, and in no time at all, we were both going back and forth like pendulums on swingsets we hadn't seen since we were ten years old.

"Is this safe?" I shouted back.

We both looked at each other before screaming at the same time, "_No."_

"Safety is for the _weak," _she said. "How d'you ever have fun?"

"Oh, come on Sam. You acted safe for a long time."

"Yeah. And I didn't have any fun."

I turned to her. "_Really?"_

She shook her head. She was grinning from ear to ear, as if her misery was the most hysterical thing in the world. "Nope! Relationships are boring. I couldn't screw around."

"Screwing around just means you're bored."

"You'd know all about boredom then," she said. "Hey, can we talk about something else? I'm too drunk for this conversation."

Since Sam had never been so blunt to me before in my life, I figured the safest thing would be to just go with it. "Sure. What d'you want to talk about."

"_Everything!"_

"Everything?"

"Everything! You're all I have, anyway."

"What the hell is _that _supposed to mean?"

"Well, if you're the only friend I have left, then you might as well _know _me."

With that, she jumped off the swing in one fluid motion, landing on her feet but sliding at the last second. Her butt hit the ground—not too hard, though—and she was laughing on the patch of grass in front us. I would've done the same, but decided to slow my swing down instead and walk off with _caution._ Fractured bones weren't exactly part of our monthly medical budget.

She was lying down in the grass, facing the sky and flat on her back. I lay down next to her. Seattle at its heart is kind of a gross city in the middle of the day, since there's never any sun and the weather is depressing. At night it's usually not much better with all of the air pollution, but that night was different. It was clear and Sam and I could see the stars from where we lay.

"But I already know you," I said. "I've known you my whole life."

"Hmm. No you don't."

"Yeah, you're right. I don't. Why don't I know you?"

"Because."

"_Because?"_

"Well, what d'you think, Freddie? You've known me my whole life, but you don't really _know _me."

"It's obvious there's two kinds of knowing here."

"No shit."

There was a pause. Maybe it was the alcohol wearing off, but for some reason, this conversation was starting to lose its lightheartedness.

"Well, I know that you have blonde hair, and that your favorite foods are ham and fatcakes and bacon, and that you're not someone to pick a fight with."

"Very true."

"And I know that there are some things I can never talk to you about," I said slowly, "Because there are some things you'd never want to me to know about you."

"Like what?"

"I dunno. Personal stuff. Maybe stuff about your mom and Tyler and Carly."

She didn't say anything for a little bit. Now the tension was tangible—at least for me. Sam was still hammered, so I doubted the severity of what I was saying was sinking in. She was probably taking a pseudo-nap.

"Ugh. My mom. She's such a terrible person."

Yup. She was _definitely _still hammered.

I didn't say anything, so to fill the silence she added. "And, ew, don't even get me started about Tyler. I _love _drinking—he's the reason I had to fucking quit!"

Huh. I sat up, looking at her and her dreamy-eyed stare. Wasn't this interesting—I knew that Sam had stopped drinking, and I knew it took a ride to the ambulance to get the job done, but the explicit reasons _why _she kept quiet about.

"Really? He told you to stop?"

She snorted. "Fuck no, he would never. But we almost had a baby—I couldn't keep drinking that stuff _and _dating him. This shit killed his child."

I didn't even grasp the magnitude of what she'd said for a few minutes. I know that Sam never would, because the girl had a sarcastic look plastered across her face, and she could've been talking about anything—the month's rent, an episode of Girly Cow, _anything. _This was a conversation we would've _never _had in a million years. Not sober, anyway. Because if there was one thing my now semi-sober self could register, it was this:

Sam was pregnant.

Not anymore, but at one point she had been, a few years back. She was a heavy drinker and every night was a hard night for her. This was when her and Tyler had been going out for a little more than a year, so they were together long enough for it to be serious, but not _too _long, so the aftermath of Spencer was still somewhat fresh. I remembered very vividly when she'd stopped. She'd been in the ER for a full two days, and me, Carly and Tyler were more than unsettled. Even Sam's sister Melanie flew out to Seattle that week. When she was discharged, the four of us sat her down the next morning, ready to have a stern talk with her and to strong-arm her into ending her habit.

But barely a word had to come out of our mouths.

"I know," she'd snapped at us before we could say anything. "No more drinking. You don't need to tell me, I already fucking get it."

There was a murderous look in her eyes that made us all stop, deciding not to say anymore. I don't think any of us took what she'd said seriously. We all expected her to slow down for a few days, sure, but to get back on it soon enough. But to our never-ending surprise, she never did. She hadn't had a drop of alcohol since then. Not until tonight, at least.

And now I was _hating _every drop of whiskey I'd let Sam drink that night, because she never would've poured her guts out to me like this otherwise. And what was worse was that she was so drunk she probably wouldn't even remember this conversation the next morning. This drug was Sam's downfall—it had an affect over her that made her let her guard down, which would otherwise be up so high _all the fucking time . . . _

And that's when the horror of this all hit me. I must've shown it, because Sam said something.

"What's gotten into you?" she snapped.

I turned to her, trying to keep my voice level. "He never knew, did he? About the baby."

"Ding ding, ten points for Fredward."

"But _you_ knew you were pregnant."

"I mean, I guess I did. In the back of my head, y'know? It didn't seem real until the doctors were telling me I'd lost her, though."

My head was spinning, and I couldn't make sense of what I was thinking. "How could you keep it a secret from him?" I blurted out.

"That part's easy." She noticed the twisted expression on my face and said, "Shit, Freddie, I keep secrets from everyone."

"But this is a big deal, it was his baby too—"

"Oh, calm down, it doesn't matter anymore. That was years ago." She thought before adding. "There's no point trying to bring back what's already gone."

And now Sam, who'd kept up a drunken and slightly amused expression up that entire conversation, was suddenly looking like something else. I couldn't quite place it, but she almost seemed . . . regretful. Regretful, mostly, but there was definitely a touch of sadness in her eyes. My mind was still in a tailspin, but I had a minute to grasp one thought. In between Sam's unborn daughter, her mother, Carly, Tyler and Spencer, Sam had lost a lot of people in her life. I was talking to a girl that could have a very black and vengeful view of the world. But instead, she chose to give up, to let those people go and to let her life become what it might be without them.

_There's no point trying to bring back what's already gone._

"C'mon," I managed, getting my feet. My throat was dry as sandpaper. "We should go home. It's getting late."

She nodded, but didn't move.

I rolled my eyes. "You know, I carried you up to my apartment the first night you slept over."

"Really?"

"Yeah. And I don't really want to do it again."

She laughed. "Alright, _fine._" She sprang to her feet, and to anyone else, she would've seemed totally unaffected by our conversation. But I knew Sam, and I knew that even though she was fine and back to her happy-go-lucky drunken self right then and there, we would have a lot to deal with come morning. The look I saw in her eyes told me that much.

Whatever it was though, it would have to wait until morning to be explored.

"I'm racing you to the street."

Before I had a chance to so much as groan, she took off, bolting across the park as if she _hadn't _just walked six miles across Seattle.

_"Sam!"_ I shouted. I sighed. There was no use in fighting. At least she had enough energy in her left to run.

_This running thing is beyond me,_ I thought, bringing myself to something of a shuffle that could probably sort-of almost qualify as an obese man's jog. "If only rollover energy existed," I muttered under my breath. I knew that this drunken, clumsy, sprinting Sam wasn't the girl I would see come morning. The next few days would be all walls, all guard, and no alcohol.

But that was tomorrow's problem. Right then and there, my only priority was finishing that "sprint" and getting the two of us to a cab in one piece. At least then I'd be able to deal with tomorrow knowing I'd gotten a good night's sleep.

XXX

A/N: Ooh, and the drama unfolds!

Hopefully that was enjoyable for y'all—these two are a blast to write. I know I'm messing around with their characterization a bit, but their true colors should really start to emerge over the next few chapters. I especially liked this one because it had all of the character building of a filler chapter, but I didn't compromise character building for drama. I hope you guys liked it too.

Thanks so much for the feedback and reviews. You all motivate me so much and I couldn't do this without you.

Blessings,

Vikki

PS. I'm realizing just now that I've never mentioned where the title of this fic comes from! I took it from Daughtry's _September. _Let me know in the reviews if you'd like to see a playlist that I keep in mind when thinking about this fic.


	11. The Runner

10

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Eleven

_The Runner_

I woke up in a pool of my own sweat the next morning. It was August, and Sam and I had been living together for a little over a month. Seattle might as well have been an oven, because my skin felt coated with humidity as I rolled out of bed this morning.

I winced at the sight of light. Someone had opened the blinds in my room, and blazing hot sunshine was filtering down on me.

"_Ugh,"_ I groaned. "_SAM."_

She barged through the door the second I said that, and it took a minute for me to rub the crud out of my eyes, because the image of her that I was looking at wasn't registering.

"You okay?" she asked. "Are you sick from last night? If you were a girl I'd offer to hold your hair back."

She was wearing a baseball cap and a modest black sports bra, along with blue Nike shorts and sneakers that were so old they looked like they'd gone through the garbage disposal a few times. I must've looked like I was in shock, because she suddenly realized that _I _realized, and I knew she was already regretting talking to me.

Here's the thing about living with Sam. I'd wake up at eight every morning, and she'd be in the shower, already ready for the day. I don't think I'd ever seen her in pajamas first thing in the morning, and well, now the answer to the quasi-mystery was right in front of me.

"Why do you look like you're going to the gym?"

"Uh…"

"_Jesus,"_ I moaned, "Sam, we don't have any money to spend on a gym membership!"

"Okay, Freddie—"

"What the _fuck _man! You don't even have a boyfriend to look good for and you _hate_ exercise, why pick now to start going to the gym?" I whined.

"Calm down," she said, rolling her eyes. I was still fuming, so she sighed as she crossed her arms and said. "I don't go to a gym, Freddie."

"Then why are you dressed like that?" That's when it hit me. "Oh my God, you're a runner."

Obviously this was something we'd laugh about later, but the entire thing was so _weird _in the moment. For one, Sam was lazy as hell back in high school, her ideal forms of exercise being . . . er, nothing, really. Unless you counted fistfights and sex exercise. In my mind, running was easily the most potent and least rewarding form of physical activity, so why Sam would pick _that _was beyond me.

"Is that what you've been doing every morning?" I asked her. "Is that why you've been getting up so early?"

She groaned and pulled her baseball cap off, wiping beads of sweat from her forehead. "I don't have time for this. It's getting hot out, I better get outside—"

"_Oh no you don't."_ I sounded so stern, she jumped. "There's no way you're not hungover from last night, and I am too so I'm coming with you."

"You want to go on a run with me?"

"I don't want to, but I'm going to."

"If you don't want to than just stay here."

"Why do I get the feeling that the only way I'm going to get an explanation to this whole running thing is if I experience it for myself?" I asked her.

She tried to fight it, but I noticed the smallest smile creep on her face. "Well, you got that part right, Fredward," she said.

"Great. So I'm going."

_"Ughhhhhh,"_ she groaned loudly, but it was comical at most because she sounded like a twelve-year-old.

As far as exercise clothes went, I had none, so I threw on the most modest boxers I owned and decided I would act like they were sports shorts. I wasn't fooling Sam, obviously, but since all I got from her were a few snickers I figured I would deal. Anyway, we jogged down the stairs after that (no elevator, for once), and the second we hit the street, she only had two words to say to me:

"No talking."

"Really?" I whined. She didn't respond, and even though I opened my mouth to say more, I shut it quickly. Okay, so maybe I didn't exactly shut it, we were running and all, but at that I'd realized that maybe not talking was her point. That and her rule was more of a disguised blessing, because I was winded within the first two minutes and wouldn't have been able to hold any kind of conversation after that.

But as we kept running, I asked myself a million times, "how the _fuck _does she do this?" We were running down one of Seattle's side-streets, winding through alleys that brought us further out of the heart of the city and into no-man's land. But that wasn't even the remarkable part. What was remarkable was how she could _stay there _mentally. Here was a girl that used to need an hourly fix of TV back in high school. Now, we were running miles on end, with only her two feet to carry her. She had no motive—there wasn't a fatcake waiting for her at the end of this, or an iPod she was listening to or sex to worry about tonight. All she had was sweaty, panting, out-of-shape me falling a few more yards behind her every block we passed.

After about half an hour, I was praying she'd call it quits, or that at the very least we'd turn around. But here's the thing—_she fucking sped up._

"How much farther?" I finally yelled from a good ten yards behind her.

"I don't know."

_That _was infuriating. "What d'you mean you don't know!"

She shrugged.

"Sam, are you telling me you don't have a destination in mind?"

"Nope!"

"Well, _perfect."_

I knew I was being a pain in the ass, so what she did next surprised me. She shortened her stride and slowed down just enough to hang back with me.

"Don't be a wuss," she ordered in between pants. "You're finishing this run. You volunteered for this, remember?"

"Yeah, but I didn't know we were running a marathon." My face went chalk white then. "Shit. We're not—"

"Oh, calm down. If I was going to take you on a 26.2 mile run, it sure as hell wouldn't be in Seattle," she said.

"How far, then?" My panting made that sentence almost incomprehensible, so I had to repeat it a few times until Sam was able to make sense of my gibberish.

"You're missing the point."

"_Huh?" _That came out as a desperate sounding grunt, but Sam got the gist of it.

"It's not about the distance, Freddie."

That's when I shut up, this time out of thought instead of exhaustion. I watched as Sam matched me, stride for stride, with the precision that only a regular runner could. While I was floundering like a fish out of water (or some other cliché metaphor like that), she was beating me down. God, did I feel like a fatass. But after about ten minutes of feeling sorry for myself, I latched on to what she said earlier.

_It's not about the distance, Freddie._

So I decided _not_ to focus on the fact that my thighs felt like jello and I was heaving like a woman in labor. Instead, I thought of Seattle. I thought of the sky. I thought of Sam, I thought of iCarly (the good days), and I thought of Gibby (also the good days.) In between the thinking and the running and the silence between us, something clicked, and slowly but surely, I sped up.

"Where d'you think you're going?" she teased.

"Hurry up, slowpoke."

She smiled, and I veered us off the road we were running on and into the unknown. The sun was really beating down on us, but at this point, I was too wrapped up in my thinking to give it much notice. I almost forgot about the looming fact that last night couldn't be ignored for forever.

Almost.

Then, after about God knows how long, we reached a clearing. By now we were far out into the Seattle suburbs, and over the edges of a cliff, we could see right into the harbor. Wordlessly, the two of us ran off the road and over by the edges of the rocks. The drop was about fifty feet and the harbor waves were rough below us.

"Any idea where we are?" I asked her. The two of us finally slowed us to a stop.

"Probably near Shorewood," she said. "I mean, I usually don't leave the city because I like to catch a bus back to the apartment," she said, giving me a toothy grin.

Agh. She was right. We weren't in the main metropolis anymore, so we'd have to run back. This time around, though, the idea didn't seem half as dreadful.

The two of us sat down in the patchy grass overlooking the harbor. It was a quiet moment, and even though we could've filled it with banter in our typical fashion, we didn't.

"So," I said finally, "Running, huh?"

"Yeah. Running."

I turned to her. "Well, I get it now. But I still don't understand what the hell made you start."

"One foot in front of the other is kind of the standard protocol…"

_"Sam."_

She picked at the grass by her feet for a minute before saying anything. "I didn't start until after that night . . . at Aztec," she said, thinking of her words carefully, not wanting to bring up Carly or Tyler's names.

"Yeah, that's what I figured."

She nodded. She was still picking at the grass. "I just . . ." she groaned. "I don't know. I know you want an explanation, but—"

"Hey, listen," I interjected. "I get it." I decided to rephrase that. "I get the _point."_ Her gaze finally lifted from the ground and met mine. "I get that it's not about the distance, or being in shape or looking good or going fast or whatever. It's about the freedom. When you run, you don't really have to think."

"Well, I don't know if I agree with that."

"Okay, so I guess you _do _think . . . but not like you normally would." I brushed some hair out of my face. I needed a haircut, and badly, but that didn't fit in our budget. "You think about the good things." Then I added, "Putting your body through the ringer forces you to think positively, anyway."

She snickered, and we both sat there, returning to our comfortable silence as we looked out over the harbor. And, for the first time, I realized in that moment how easy things were. How _this _was easy. Being with Sam for the last month hadn't been easy, not in the slightest, but this was the one time I could finally feel like I was really at home with her.

This was the first time I understood what she was thinking without her having to say anything.

And, like that, a trigger went off in my head. _Last night, Freddie. If there was ever a time to address it, it would be now._

A part of me so desperately wanted to ignore what I knew—I'd wished that Sam had never been drunk, had never told me about her unborn child so we could go on living in our already complicated mess of things, because at least then and there I knew how I could _slightly _uncomplicate us. But then what? If I pretended not to know about Sam's miscarriage, then I was pretending not to know Sam. This girl was by no means "easy." So, even as I was just starting to get comfortable, I took a deep breath, because I knew complication was the only way I'd be able to really understand.

"Do you remember any of last night?" I asked.

She noticed the calculation in my voice, and her eyes flickered from the horizon to mine before finally meeting mine dead-on. "Bits and pieces," she said slowly.

"Do you remember what you told me?"

She didn't say anything at first.

"I thought I didn't. And I sure thought you didn't."

And, like that, the spell was broken. Her face was impassive, unreadable. We were complicated again.

_Fuck! _a part of me screamed.

She got to her feet and said, "We should probably head home."

"Wait."

"Freddie, it's a long run back—"

"_Wait."_

She stopped.

"No more alcohol for you, okay?" I said. She looked surprised. She was probably expecting a rah-rah, 'let me _know _you, I need to understand you' conversation, but that was the absolute worst thing I could do in that moment. "The last thing I need is for you to tell me something you don't want me to know over a few rounds of whiskey."

"It's not that I didn't want you to know about the baby, it's that you weren't ready to know it," she snapped. She sighed, frustrated. "Freddie, I'm not living with you any longer than I have to."

And, then, there it was. There was the piece of the equation I was missing all along.

"What d'you mean?"

"I'm only staying with you until I can scrape together enough cash. I'm sorry, I didn't want to tell you like this, but—"

"Sam, where the hell d'you think you're going to go?" I didn't realize my voice was raising to an above-normal level. "I'm all you have left!"

"Freddie—"

"Goddamnit, you're all _I_ have left!"

"Calm down. You're taking on more than you can handle with me."

"I've been handling you for the last month—"

"Yeah, and you've been doing a fucking _fantastic _job," she snapped sarcastically. It was a blow, and a low one at that, but I didn't register what she saying. Not in the slightest. Because Sam was _not_ leaving. Not after everything we'd been through and how much we had left ahead of us.

"Let me help you, Sam."

"You can't help me."

"Then at least let me try."

She opened her mouth, exasperated, then shut it quickly before turning on her heel. "We should go," she said.

"Sam, I'm not dropping this."

She whipped back around to face me. Her face was red, and I didn't know if it was from today's impending sunburn or anger. "You have to. Stop trying to know me and stop trying to figure me out."

"Okay, this is definitely about what happened last night, because you were going on and on about how I _should_ know you—"

"I was drunk!"

"Yeah, and your guard was down for once and you were actually acting like your real self!"

Oh, shit. Those words had definitely not just come out of my mouth.

She looked away, and I don't know what her expression was, but I knew it was something I wouldn't want to see. She turned on her heel and started jogging off for Seattle. I followed her, because even if I'd just acted like the biggest fucktard in history, I wasn't dropping this that easily.

"Listen—"

"Fuck off," she snapped.

"I'm just trying to understand—"

"And you _don't _fucking understand, because you're _trying _to understand! So let me make it crystal fucking clear _right now—,"_she was seething, "Stop trying to understand. Stop trying _so hard _to understand, because all you're doing is wasting your time. Forget what I said last night, because I don't want you to know me."

A part of me should've been offended, but I still wasn't buying it.

"I think you do," I told her, but after seeing the look on her face I quickly added, "But there must be some reason why you won't let me in."

She laughed dryly in between the pants of her running. "Trust me, Freddie," she said. "It's better if you don't know that reason."

XXX

Our feet slammed against the concrete. It was breath in, breath out. The sun was starting to dip low on the horizon, and I wondered how long we'd been out on the road. We must've taken a wrong turn somewhere, because the way back was definitely longer than the way out.

Whenever I looked to see her, I couldn't catch a glimpse of her face. All I'd see were a rush of blonde curls. We ran in a silence that wasn't comfortable anymore, and even as the late afternoon sky beat down on us, I couldn't take it in. If you've ever had your brain working on overload before, imagine having it work on overload during an hour long run. It got to a point where I was so lost in my thoughts, I hardly noticed the motions of my legs.

Maybe that's the beauty of the sport, as I was realizing, and why Sam had grown so enamored by it—you could think as much or as little as you wanted to. What I was dreading this morning turned out to my biggest aid that day, because if it wasn't for the lactic acid buildup in my thighs or the beating of my heart, my brain would've never been able to narrow down the following facts:

Fact: Sam wanted me to know her.

Fact: I knew this because she said it when she was drunk.

Fact: Sam didn't want me to know her.

Fact: That's typical Sam for you.

And, as usual, I realized there was a piece of this equation I was missing. Drunk Sam had no inhibitions—she'd run her mouth and she'd let her guard down, revealing a side of her that wasn't necessarily vulnerable, but deadpan _honest. _Honesty wasn't something I got from this girl a lot. Not without the influence of alcohol, at least.

But in between drunk and sober Sam, what was the reason she had to not let me in? _Why _did she insist on rejecting my help so much? At this point, I'd proven clear as fucking day that she could trust me—was she afraid I wouldn't trust her?

Impossible.

But as we plodded along the road back to Seattle, the cloud in my brain wouldn't clear. I had absolutely no idea why this girl would reject me sober but open her arms to me drunk. Something told me that last night was only the tip of the iceberg, and there plenty of other things I didn't know about the girl with blonde curls. Why the _hell _wouldn't she let me in?

Or, better yet, why did it bother me so much that she shut me out?

Fact: things weren't easy. Not yet at least.

Fact: Being thirty-five years old and looking back at this run now, I think that the nearly twenty-three year old me is an _idiot, _because I hadn't realized the most obvious part of the equation yet.

And even now, as I'm sitting in this coffee shop, it's hard not smile when I think of just how close I was to finding out that reason, and how far that reason would take us.

A/N: Ye-haw!

So, this is inexcusably late, as I'm well aware. The worst part is that I don't have any reason other than sheer laziness, so I apologize with how negligent I was on updates this past month. But I was recently re-inspired as far as this fic goes, and now that it's heading back in the direction I want it to. Also, I planned out how long I'm expecting this fic to be, and I've figured out by now that I'm in for the long haul. That being said, I don't want this plot-bunny to become sixty chapters long by the end, so I think I'm going to bump the word count up to about 4K per chapter and keep the updates at every other week (because, let's face it, weekly updates are where I fail miserably as an author, so hopefully the longer chapters will be worth a bit of a longer wait.)

A few other end-notes: yes, I needed to add in at least _one_ running-centric chapter in this fic :D It's such a big part of my own life and identity, so even if this entire scene seems wildly OOC to some of you, consider it as me adding a part of myself to this fic. Even then, hopefully I justified Sam's reasons for her morning runs—I figured she wouldn't give a fuck about her health or looking good, so it's more about the _escape _than anything else to her. Considering she really can't drink, running is as close as she can get to a real buzz/high while still helping her think.

(My god, I rhyme.)

And now for probably the most exciting announcement of the day-I've joined the iCabal!

**Read**

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(My personal favorites would have to be Aussiemma's "Kiss with a Fist" for angst and JamesTheGreater's "My Mistake" for ICness, but really, all of these authors are absolutely lovely :D)

On that note, as always, thank you so much for all of the continued love and support. I love you guys and thanks for baring with me during my inexcusably long hiatus and this inexcusably long author's note xx

Blessings,

~Vikki


	12. Lies and Walls

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Twelve

_Lies and Walls_

"Does bacon for breakfast sound good?"

"…"

"Sam?"

"Hm?"

"D'you want bacon with your waffles?"

"I don't fucking care."

"Someone's PMSing . . ."

"Benson."

"Yeah?"

"Shut up."

Those next few weeks were _painful. _

My life was quickly becoming a Samantha Puckett timeline, and by _God _was it wearing me down. After that run it took me five minutes to realize how badly I fucked up, and even though I hoped it would get better with time, I realized fast enough—it wasn't going to.

Sure, I tried. I'd bake her pancakes and buy her fatcakes and make bacon and do anything else I possibly could that was food related, but that didn't accomplish much of anything. The truth was still looming in front of me: Sam hated me, and the second she could she was abandoning me. Why she didn't move out right then and _there_ was the biggest mystery, because she was miserable to the millionth degree. But now that I think about it, I hadn't seen much of Sam in those coming weeks. She spent her time either a) out on a run or b) asleep.

But that wasn't the annoying part. Because even though I wasn't seeing much of her, she wasn't exactly _avoiding _me—she just wasn't there. I could see her, and I could talk to her, but I wasn't really talking to _her. _I was talking to someone who didn't speak unless spoken to, gave the shortest and rudest possible responses and wouldn't look me in the eye. It was like Middle School all over again.

"Hey Sam, my birthday's coming up in a few weeks—"

"Congratu_fucking_lations."

"Okay. Never mind, I guess first-rate Italian food isn't your thing, because I kind of wanted to make a dinner reservation to celebrate."

Well, the restaurant part was sort of a lie, but the birthday thing was true. Sam looked over to me, and even though I thought I saw a bit of interest, she scrunched her nose and waved me away.

"Go take your mom out to dinner or something. Girly Cow's on that night, I can't miss it."

I was about to make a retort, but I shut my mouth. She remembered what day my birthday was, and that was a start for me.

I don't even _know_ why I was trying so hard to fix things. Maybe it was guilt, or maybe it was the fact that I'd gotten a glimpse of a Sam I'd grown fond. Whatever it was, trying to win her back was putting me through hell, because nothing seemed to work.

As fate would have it, our standoff came to a head a week before my birthday, just when all hope seemed lost.

The phone rang on a late August morning. Sam was out of the house—to be honest, I don't remember her coming home the previous night. I was out late working.

"Hello?"

"Hi, is this Freddie Benson speaking?"

"Yes, this is he."

"This is Susan from Vancouver Medical, you're listed as a person of reference for Samantha Puckett—"

"Did something happen to her?" I asked, jumping a little where I stood.

"She's in the hospital, we'd like you to come down to the center right away—"

"Is she okay?"

"Yes, she'll be fine Mr. Benson. She was running late last night and she fainted near Vancouver, a couple from LA picked her up from the road early this morning and dropped her off."

"Wait, she's in _Vancouver_? How did she wind up out there?"

I heard some muffled sounds over the phone. "She'll be fine, Freddie, Dr. Hoffman's been taking care of her. Fatigue and dehydration are the two main diagnostics, it's nothing rare in a runner who exercises for that length of time. We estimated she was a good eighty miles along when she fainted, can you confirm that?"

"Well, we live in Seattle, so that's pretty accurate."

I felt a bead of sweat trickle down my neck. _Eighty miles! _Exactly how far (no pun intended) had this running thing gone without me realizing?

"When could we expect you?" Susan asked.

"I'm leaving right now." I was already pulling a jacket on, and I didn't even realize it when I said, "I feel like such a dispshit, I should've posed on an intervention or something . . ."

"Are you her husband, fiancé?"

"No, just a friend."

"Oh. Well she refused to have us call her mother or sister, she made sure it was you."

A lump rose in my throat, but I didn't address it because my only aim was making sure I got out of the apartment as fast as my legs would let me. Even then, I felt a pang of _something _in my chest, and I was having a hard time pushing it to the back of my mind.

_She made sure it was you._

XXX

The ride back from Vancouver was quiet, which wasn't anything too weird because "quiet" was becoming the norm between me and Sam. That and she was half-asleep once we'd left the hospital, so what little I could get out of Sam wasn't very coherent.

"It's remarkable she managed to get so far without any fluids, the fact that she didn't faint sooner is amazing," Dr. Hoffman had said to me, just after leaving the room.

"Yeah, well, she doesn't exactly do things by the book."

He laughed. "Is that so?"

"Always. There really isn't any fighting it."

"Well, listen, you take care of her. We already broke the news to her but it's your job to enforce it, she can't run for the next two weeks."

I tried to hide the smile as it was stretching on my face, because that was music to my ears. I could only wonder how she'd fill all of that time.

"That and once she _is_ back on track, I'd sign her up for some official races if I were you."

"For real?"

He nodded. "Runners that can go eighty miles on yesterday morning's breakfast are hard to come by. If the two of you are trying to scrape cash together for a wedding, you'd be surprised at how fast the money would come rolling in if she made something out of this."

"Oh, we're not together," I said quickly. That seemed to be the assumption, considering we lived under the same roof. "That and I don't think it's really my place to tell her what she should and shouldn't be doing." I noticed the look on Dr. Hoffman's face and added, "I'll bring races up to her, but I won't push it."

"Fair enough, I figured I'd mention it." All the while he was scribbling some notes on a pad of lined paper, only looking up to meet my eyes when he had to. He took a long break from whatever he was scribbling and said, "You take care of her, alright?"

"Sure thing, Doc."

He reached out his hand, and I shook it, turning on my heel to leave. Before I did, I heard him say after me, "Freddie?"

I turned around.

"Not that it's any of my business, but it takes a lot for a girl to put a friend before her mother and sister. A lover, not so much."

I couldn't even act taken aback by his comment at this point, because a part of me was thinking the same thing. "I'll keep that in mind," I said drily.

XXX

We walked through the door of my apartment later that night, and I could tell something was off.

"Sam?"

A shadow fell across her face. She lifted her head just the smallest bit, her eyebrow cocked up towards the ceiling. Her lip quivered, and it happened so quickly that I thought I imagined it. She sighed, throwing her jacket down and taking a deep breath as she said, "I binge drink, and I wind up in the hospital. I run eighty miles, and I still wind up in the hospital. How fucking cool am I?"

She was upset with herself, I could tell. But at least we were having this conversation. Even though she still couldn't look me in the eye, this was much better than the stalemate we were in for the last few weeks.

"I'm sorry you got hurt."

She laughed darkly.

"Really." I shifted my weight. "I know that the last few weeks have been rough, and I get it, you want to move out. But you can't run miles on end as an escape."

She didn't respond, so I threw my hands up. _Fine, I'll keep talking then. _"If you'd let me understand, then maybe I'd understand what you need an escape for. But the more you push me out, the more hurt you're going to get."

She whipped around to face me. She looked me in the eye. I've never seen such wild blue eyes.

"You don't really hate me, do you?" I asked quiet.

She opened her mouth the smallest bit, and just when I thought I was going to get something out of her, she closed it. She extinguished the fire that was in her eyes and reverted back to the dull, catatonic Sam that'd returned for the last few weeks. She put her head down and started walking for the kitchen. That was when I felt a wave of rage wash over me, because I'd _finally_ gotten a glimpse of the girl I was getting to know, the one that was the other half to an uncomplicated "us." But as usual, the second things got tricky, she disappeared. Sam reverted back to her walls and shut me out the best she could, because there was a line she would never let me cross, and things about her she would never let me understand.

I could run. I could leave it be and pretend that I _really _thought she hated me. But for some reason, this was the night I worked up the nerve to fight back.

"Sam," I said. She didn't respond. "Sam." I reached out and grabbed her arm.

She turned around, facing me. "Jesus Christ, what's your problem? Let go of me."

"No."

She wrung her wrist, trying to get out of my grasp. "Freddie, I just came back from the hospital after nearly _dying_ of dehydration. I'm not in the mood. Back off."

My arm went slack, and Sam quickly jerked her hand away.

"What is it with you?" I asked.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

_I don't know what you're talking about. _Biggest fucking lie of the century. _What is it with you? Why do shut me out so much? Why do you try so hard to keep me away, when we both know that we're the best thing for each other right now? Why won't you just grow the fuck up and let me help you?_

Instead, I rolled my eyes. "You know, we've gone through hell together these past few weeks."

"So?"

My gut churned as I heard that word come out of her mouth. So? _So? _That's all she could say to me?

_'Rage'_ was a bit of an understatement. I was starting to lose my temper.

I searched the look on her face, trying to find even the smallest inkling of emotion. But her walls were up, and they were up too high.

"You don't have to pretend, Sam," I said. Before she opened her mouth to say anymore, I continued. "Not around me. I get it, you're not the emotional type."

"I've been trying to fracture your skull since the sixth grade," she said, raising an eyebrow. "How the hell am I not the emotional type?"

I crossed my arms. "The only Sam I know is the one that wants to fracture my skull."

She opened her mouth to say something, closing it quickly.

"I don't know another you," I said. "I don't know much more about you besides that. I've gotten the glimpse of a Sam that's human, but I don't think you want me to see her, do you?"

I knew I said just the right thing, because within a minute, her hands were at my throat. She backed me up against the wall, all five and a half feet of her pressed against my body as she got right in my face, nose to nose. And all the while, the only thing I could think was _yes. Yes, _thank _fucking _god, because now I was getting the real Sam when she was perfectly sober.

"You want human?" she seethed. I could tell her blood was boiling. "You want to see the girl who you think is the 'real' me? Well, I can't give that to you. Who says I want you to see the human me?"

I could hardly choke the words out, she was crushing my throat so hard.

"You do."

She let go of me, stumbling backwards.

"Then fine!" she shrieked. "Fine, so maybe I'm not a total monster. But you know what, Fredward? You don't want to see another side of me. I can tell you right now that you'll _hate _it. You want to know why? Because _I _hate it."

That was when I saw it—Sam's walls were starting to deteriorate. I was going to know the one part of the equation I'd been missing all along. I only had to say one more thing, and I knew it had to be said perfectly. One wrong slip-up, and whatever it was that I had with Sam would be over for good.

"Try me. Puckett, try me. See how hard you'll have to try to get me to hate you," I said. Her expression was absolutely murderous, but the words kept shooting out from my mouth. "Because that's what you've been trying to do for _years, _and it hasn't worked. You taunt me, you tease me, you bitch about me and you've publicly humiliated me, but no matter how hard you try you've never fucking been able to get me to hate you. And I know that bugs you. But you've also been shutting me out, and I know there's a part of you that wants to let me in. You think I'll hate the human side of you so much? So, here's your shot, Sam. Go ahead—make me hate you."

There was a moment there where I thought I'd lost her.

The silence that filled the room was so thick it was almost poisonous. She just stood there, her expression morphing into something I couldn't quite make out. I knew her angry face well, but this was something entirely different. It was almost . . . desperate.

"She's a fucking perfect bitch, that's what she is!" If there was one thing I hadn't expected, it was for the tears to come out of Sam's eyes. But, there they were, streaming down her face as she screamed in front of me. "Carly Shay, so freaking beautiful and kind and perfect to just about anyone she ever met! Well, look at how great that turned out. Next thing I know, fifteen years of friendship are gone and she's hooking up with my boyfriend. Now I'm stuck living with _you, _and I can't help but notice small things, and I don't know if I want to kiss you or kill you when you walk through the door-" She was rambling so fast, I almost missed what had just been said. She stopped talking, bringing her hands up to her eyes and wiping them quickly.

I froze. That was the part of the equation.

She was genuinely unhinged, standing there in front of me. She was furiously wiping away the tears in her eyes, tears I'd never seen her shed before in her life. She was crying over Carly, over Tyler, over everything that'd happened in the last two months. And now, now I knew why all along she was so afraid of letting me in. I knew the answer.

She shrugged, letting her blonde hair drop. Her face burned red. "You wanted to know," was all she could mutter.

I shook my head. This moment . . . it wasn't happening.

"Sam . . ."

"You always want to know why it's so hard for me to talk about my feelings, for me to let you understand? Now you know, dipshit. I've only got one question to ask you know—what the _fucking hell _did you get out of this?"

My heart was racing. This was the truth all along. And Sam couldn't handle it, she couldn't handle the fact that she was getting so close to me when she was starting to feel something else.

Just like I couldn't handle the idea of losing her.

I felt my jaw drop the slightest, because in that moment, everything clicked. Why I felt the need to know her, why she felt the need to shut me out . . . it was all adding up the _reality._

It was impossible. It was illogical. But it was the cold, hard truth.

In that minute, I let the universe take over.

_Screw logic._

"So much more than you'll ever realize, because you aren't going to let me respond, are you?"

She looked up, her gaze meeting mine.

I lowered my voice. The nagging voice in the back of my head kept telling me the same thing; "Shut the fuck up, Benson."

_Fuck you._

"Because we're both scared. We're both scared of what's happening," I continued. I could feel my palms sweating.

"Freddie—"

"Sam, I'm in love with you."

The words came out of my mouth, and I knew there would be no stopping them because there was no stopping what was about to happen.

A silence hung in the air for a minute before she finally responded.

"What . . .?"

"I'm fucking sick and tired of all the games and lies," I continued. "I don't know why or how, but if there's one thing I _do _know, it's that I'm completely not supposed to feel this way about you. But you know what? I do. I do, and that's the end of it."

"I—I don't understand . . ." her voice was so soft, I could hardly hear it.

_The real Samantha Puckett, ladies and gentlemen._

I wanted to say more, but I didn't. I gave her a minute. I could tell she needed time to have everything sink in. In the back of my mind though, the nagging voice kept telling me, _you need this minute more than she does. _

It seemed like ages passed by. Sam was still looking at me like a deer caught in headlights, not sure what to do or say. It got to a point where I turned on my heel, heading for the empty bedroom. Maybe what I said was entirely wrong, and that given everything that had just happened, it was the worst possible thing I could say. But it was the truth.

Before I knew what hit me, she whirled me back around. Her lips crushed against mine, in a kiss that was such a long time coming it felt like a burden being lifted from my shoulders. I held her there for a minute, keeping her close. It felt hot—not like a passionate hot or a horny hot, but almost like I was about to pass out from heat exhaustion. I can't tell you how much I loved that feeling.

My hands traveled down from her face, down her neck and down her back, down and everywhere . . . that's the only word I could use to describe it. My hands were absolutely everywhere. Not that Sam was any exception—she pressed so close against me, I could almost feel her heart beat from under her flesh. She was so close, and I only wanted her closer. I only wanted more of her.

_More._

"More?" she whispered. I didn't realize I'd said that aloud.

I hardly had time to nod as she backed me up into the bedroom.

It was then I suddenly became aware of everything—how blue her eyes were, how crooked her fingers were, how soft her bare skin felt. She ripped off her shirt without hesitation, her top hitting the wall as she snatched the buckle of my pants. A part of me (the only part of me left with any degree of reason) kept eating at me. _This is wrong. This is so wrong. You're stripping Sam Puckett._

Well, to be entirely fair to my logical side—she was also stripping me.

Clothes were everywhere. On my dresser, in heaps on the floor, hanging off my lamp. My fingers traveled up and down her spine as she toyed with me, lying me flat on my back and reaching for me. I stared up at the ceiling, feeling the crevices in her back. Her lips moved back to mine. She was right on top of me. It was so quick, and in that split second, the reality of what was going on came crashing down on me. It'd been weeks since I'd last been with someone, but going through the motions felt beyond natural with her. I moved inside of her body, and I could only choke out one thought in between all of the warmth and muddled feelings in my head.

_I'm having sex with Sam Puckett._

That was when I cried out. She didn't seem to mind, because she was moving right along with me. For what seemed like ages, the only thing that could come out of my mouth was her name. There was so much more I wanted and felt like I had to say, but whenever I tried, the same three letters wound up popping out instead.

"Freddie," she said. Her voice shot up a good octave. She whispered my name into my ear, digging her nails into my back as I gave one last push.

I rolled over to my side. The only sound inside the bedroom was our breathing, and it filled up whatever void we'd felt before. It took me a minute before I realized that void was gone. Because, quite honestly, that void was the unknown. That void was everything we'd left unsaid. It was the part of the equation I hadn't figured out. Now that the words had been spoken, we couldn't go back to whatever we had before.

It took me a minute for the words to register in my head. And, once they rang true and seemed to actually make sense, I said them before I realized that they were coming out of my mouth.

"You _actually _had sex with me."

I didn't know what I expected Sam's reaction to be. Frustration, maybe, and anger, probably.

She let out a small laugh. "Yeah. Funny how things work, isn't it?"

XXX

A/N: It only took me 30,000 words to get to this point, but it was definitely worth it. For those of you that didn't know, the lemon portion of this chapter was originally a one-shot I posted a year ago entitled _Lies and Walls. _It served as the inspiration for this story, and to be honest I always saw that one-shot as a scene taken from the incredibly long-winded fic you're reading right now. Those of you that are familiar with _Lies and Walls _probably noticed that this isn't _exactly _the same scene, I had to add some things in to fit the context of this fic so the wording is a little different. The meat of the scene is still the same (and so is most of the dialogue), and I couldn't be more happy with how this chapter turned out.

Gahh. All I can say is _yes. Yes yes yes yes yes._ This chapter was such a blast to write/edit, I really enjoyed re-reading it and I hope you guys liked it as much as I did. So, now, time to move into writing the fun part of this fic :D

Blessings,

Vikki


	13. Love, Sex, and the Meaning Thereof

8

A/N: This chapter ran painfully late for a number of reasons. Travelling was definitely one, but I had to completely the old version of this chapter I'd written, because I started making things too fluffy too quickly. So instead of fluff, you guys get steam. That's how it's done :D

xx Vikki

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Thirteen

_Love, Sex, and the Meaning Thereof_

I started swearing to high heaven when my phone went off.

_"Fuck!"_

I snapped my mouth shut, because everyone in the coffee shop was staring at me and I literally looked like the biggest dumbass in the century. But, _goddamnit, _I was just getting into the good part of the story. Was it too much to ask for the peace and quiet I needed to reminisce?

Apparently.

So I looked at the caller ID, and—lo and behold—my wife was on the other line. Wasn't that the mother of all irony.

"I'm a terrible husband." I pressed the decline button. I'd given the women eight and a half years of my life, she could deal with an afternoon of solitude.

I sighed, turning my attention to the clock on the wall. 10:52. _That's it? _I thought. It'd only taken me three and half hours to get to this point. My breath stopped short for a bit, because it was then that I realized just how much I had left to go. That night was the first of many. I still had so much ground to cover as far as me and Sam went.

_Yup, _I thought, _I'm going to be here all day._

I started to slip back into my reverie. I felt the years melting off of me as I did. I wasn't thirty-five anymore; I was twenty-two, almost twenty-three and lying in the same bed as Sam for the first morning ever.

XXX

She was showering when I woke up, naturally.

_"Sam,"_ I groaned.

"I didn't run, I promise!"

In the midst of all the sex and only half-resolved emotions, her dehydration episode could've easily taken a backseat, and it would be all-too-Sam-like for her to ignore the Doc's "no running" rule. But I took one glance at the hamper and didn't see any sweaty clothing, so I didn't call BS. I sat up, rolling my neck out. I looked down at the sheets.

It wasn't a dream after all. Last night had definitely happened.

There wasn't a stitch of clothing on my body, so for decency's sake I threw on some boxers. As I pulled the fabric over my groin, it all hit me. The sex. My confession. Sam being in the shower right now. My heart raced, and it was so much that I had to sit down just to catch my breath. And, almost as if on cue, same walked out of the bathroom then, her hair dripping wet.

I turned to face her. She was in a bra and panties, but there wasn't anything sexual about it because she was already rummaging around for clothing.

I cleared my throat. "Good morning."

She looked up fleetingly. Maybe I imagined it, but I saw her blush a little. "We can talk about last night later," she said quickly.

Welp. She was avoiding the subject, but at least she was getting to the point. "Not now?"

"No, I have to go."

I thought for a second. "It's Sunday, you don't have work today."

"Not to _work, _dumbass, to the drugstore."

I furrowed my brow. "Why?"

She looked up at me and threw her shirt on in a huff. "Because I had unprotected sex with you last night and I'm not ready for motherhood! That's why."

I was still kind of groggy, but the gears were finally turning in my head. "Oh. Right."

She rolled her eyes, zipping up her jeans. I was a few seconds too late in realizing that my eyes were trained on her breasts, because she was giving me a good glare by the time I had enough sense to look away.

"Would you be up for lunch later?" I asked. "Because I really think we should talk about what happened."

"You really want an entire restaurant to eavesdrop in on our sex lives, Freddie?"

I groaned. "Right, because that's _definitely _all that happened last night," I snapped. "It's not like I said 'I love you' or anything."

Her face went pink. Okay, so she remembered that part too.

"Sam, you owe me. We'll go get _Jasmine's_ at noon. You better be there."

She thought for a minute and sighed. "Alright. Fine."

I nodded.

The two of us shifted awkwardly where we stood. Just as she turned on her heel to leave, I pulled her back in towards me. I kissed her on the lips. I pulled away, and we looked each other in the eyes.

"I'll see you later," she said. She turned back around and left.

I couldn't quite figure out the tone in her voice, but it was definitely the one I wanted.

XXX

_Jasmine's_ was exactly what it sounds like. It's an Indian joint down the block from where our apartment was.

I was there a little before twelve. Sam was late, and that's kind of her MO. She waltzed through the door at 12:10.

"Huh. You're earlier than usual," I teased when she sat down.

She rolled her eyes.

"Did you get what you needed?" I asked. Keeping my tone light was hard.

She nodded, and her face got pinched up for a second before she sighed. "We should be fine, anyway," she said, waving her hand. "I finished my period last week anyway."

"Oh. Well I guess that explains part of the reason why you—"

She glared at me, so I shut up.

"Don't push me, Freddie." she muttered.

I cleared my throat. Anticipating Sam's reactions used to be agonizing, back when I didn't know what to expect. This back-and-forth was exhausting, I won't deny it, but the fact of the matter was that just the night before she'd thrown herself at me and ripped my clothes off. That's not an image I'll forget easily.

It's not like it's an image I've forgotten in the last twelve years, anyway.

"You can trust me." I looked her in the eye. "You know that, right?"

And when she opened her mouth, I knew it was stupid to think that one night made everything change.

"Can I?" she answered. I rolled my eyes, and she raised her hands defensively. She must've noticed the hurt on my face, because she blushed then and said, "Freddie—"

"No, I get it," I cut in.

_You dumbass, _I thought. I watched her shift uncomfortably, and the fact that we were in a crowded restaurant was all that could keep me from screaming obscenities at myself. My life wasn't a fairytale—hell, I wasn't even sure that a fairytale was what I _wanted, _but the conversation we were having wasn't what I wanted.

Then again, it was the one I expected.

So sex didn't change anything. That shouldn't be a surprise, considering this was Sam Puckett I was talking about. But there was something about the look on her face that made me inclined to ask, because she would be an idiot to say it was a casual thing.

"I know you don't exactly love freely, but I need to ask."

She looked up.

"Did last night change anything?"

Eugh. _Damn you! _I screamed. I sounded like a blushing schoolboy.

If she'd ever have an opportunity to rip me up, then this was it. Because at this point she had me vulnerable, and there wasn't any going back.

I was a little surprised that she didn't take that opportunity. And then I remembered—last night, _she_ was the vulnerable one.

She sighed. "I know that I feel something for you, if that's what you're asking."

My heart skipped a beat. "Then what?"

Her hands went up. "I don't know! Maybe that's why I don't trust you as much as you'd want me to." She ran a hand through her blonde curls. I had to do a drool check, since that small motion alone was enough to spike my hormones. "But Freddie . . . I'm not going anywhere."

I furrowed my brow. "What do you mean?"

"Well, you know how I said I wanted to move out?" She shook her head. "I'm not." She paused before adding. "I don't exactly know what this is. But I know I need time to figure it out."

And my heart continued to hammer out of my chest. _This is a start, _I told myself. "Figure out your feelings for me?" I asked. I felt a smile creep up on my face.

"I guess."

Okay. So this was good.

I kicked back in my chair, taking a minute to soak in her body cues, her expression, everything._ We've come a long way, _I thought. Because now, the girl sitting in front of me was starting to make a little more sense.

She was guarded. Even in the eleventh hour, she wouldn't lay it all out on the line.

Maybe that's why I liked her so much.

So I got a little smug and asked, "This whole feeling thing; should we be doing it with or without sex?"

I laughed, because the eye roll she gave me was pretty funny. "I'll put it to you this way—if you sleep with anyone else, I'll cut off your testicles in your sleep, Benson."

That basically wrapped up the end of our serious conversation, because let's be frank; we didn't do serious. We did dysfunctional and impromptu and spur of the moment and (on occasion) drunk, but serious only happened when it was absolutely unavoidable. So we ate the rest of our lunch. We had our witty banter, we joked around and we laughed until chicken curry was threatening to come out of our nostrils. And even though we were the last thing from "defined" or "figured out" or "exclusive," we were the one thing we both needed the most.

Easy.

"So," she said as we got up from our seats, "someone's birthday is at the end of the week."

"Yeah. You're right."

"I think I remember you mentioning the 'best Italian food in Seattle' . . .?"

I laughed. "Well, that was kind of a lie. But I can make a reservation."

She smiled. "Sounds good, Benson."

XXX

The best Italian Restaurant in Seattle required reservations six months in advance, so we opted for something less pretentious. _Terrazzo Carmine _was a close second, with much more modest prices and two seats available at the bar. It was a fancy joint, so I asked Sam to get dolled up as I spent the day shopping for a suit (my old one was only from, gee, I dunno, tenth grade.)

We met at the restaurant at seven. She didn't disappoint.

"Pick your jaw up off the floor, Freddie, it doesn't belong there," she said, giving me a smile. The strappy pumps, red dress, and messy bun were a good look on her.

"Would it be awkward if I called you hot right now?" I asked.

"What do you think?"

"You look hot."

"Thanks, Fredward."

The bar was noisy, the bar was busy, and the bar was anything Sam and I could've asked for. Our orders were taken, and since Sam and I apparently didn't have any say in the matter, a round of vodka was sent over before we could debate.

"Oh no—" I told her.

She rolled her eyes. "Relax." Noticing my expression, she said, "I'm not going to get drunk, it's your birthday. Let's just have a good time."

I didn't want to argue with her, so I asked, "I'm assuming that means a good time later too?"

We both laughed at that, downing our shots. "I'll need another round before I can make up my mind about that."

We stopped after about four rounds, which was just enough to get the two of us buzzed. The food didn't disappoint—I could see why the Zagat rating for this place was as good as it was.

"So—the big 23, huh?" she said.

"Yeah. Can you believe High School was five years ago?"

She shook her head. "It feels like I'm living it, man."

I nodded. "I'll drink to that."

"Have you talked to your mom?"

The question was out of left field a bit, but four rounds in it was only natural for Sam to start saying absolutely anything on her mind. "She left me a voicemail today. Why?"

"Nothing. It just doesn't seem like you've seen much of her."

I gave her a shove in the arm. "Pot-kettle, Sam."

She jumped up out of her seat when she saw our waiter. "Hey! It's his birthday!" She grabbed my shirt collar, stretching the fabric. "Can we get a fattening cake over here?"

You'd figure the servers to be turned off by this behavior at such a prissy place, but Sam had the looks to get away with it. "How old?" he asked, amused.

"Twenty-three," I responded.

Naturally, a chocolate cake with twenty-three candles came out just minutes later. The waiters were tone deaf and the cake was on the cold side, but hell, it was my birthday cake. I ate every fucking slice without shame.

"Well, thank you for embarrassing me," I told her with a laugh.

She gave me a scout's salute. "All in a day's work."

The bartender must've been eavesdropping the whole time, because as we signed the check he asked, "How long have you two been together for?"

I opened my mouth to tell him, "Oh . . . gee . . . you see . . ." (how the fuck would I have been able to explain our situation anyway?), but Sam swooped in and said, "Seven years. He threw himself in front of a BMW for me in tenth grade."

She winked, so I decided to play along. "Arghh. I remember that. Damn you, Gibby!"

The bartender laughed. "Well don't be damning him, he's the reason you're dating such a beauty."

I thanked Sam for the whole relationship plot, because I'm sure that if _I'd _spoken, he probably would've tried to take her home.

We jumped in a cab, and about ten minutes into the drive, the two of us fell asleep. The driver had to wake us up, and when he did Sam basically had her head in my lap.

She wobbled up the stairs, a little buzzed but definitely awake as we made our way into the apartment.

"You feeling okay?" I asked. Her balance (or lack thereof) made me worry.

"Me? I feel great! It's these fucking stilettos-" She stopped mid stride, yanking the shoes off her feet. "_There._"

We walked through the door. The minute it shut behind us, she put her arms around my neck and looked me in the eye.

"Happy Birthday, Freddie."

I gulped. Oh, our lips were threateningly close to one another. It'd been almost a week since we had sex, and now, I was having a hard time ignoring the bulge in my pants.

"Thanks," I whispered hoarsely.

She kissed me, and the taste of alcohol on her breath was enough to bring me to my senses, even if it was only for a minute. "This isn't the alcohol acting, is it?"

She shook her head. "C'mon, Freddie, think a little more of me," she whispered in my ear. "I told you, it's your birthday. Let's have a good time."

"This included?" My voice was shaky.

She smiled. "That was kind of my plan all along."

Oh, did the two of us wind up on the floor in a matter of _seconds,_ wrestling with one another as we exchanged only semi-sober kisses. But something told me this _wasn't _only alcohol acting, because the sexual tension between the two of us was enough to begin with anyway. So I kissed her, and I didn't worry about doing it right. Our first night was fulfilling. Tonight was greedy. It was my birthday, goddamnit. I was going to get some head and be on top and do whatever the fuck I wanted, because I deserved that.

But she didn't seem to mind. Her bra didn't even make it off her body that night. Before much could register in my head she was already down on me, bobbing my member in her mouth.

"Tell me what you like," she said when she came up for air.

"I don't need to tell you," I managed, "You're doing it perfectly."

This wasn't her birthday gift to me, not by any means. Her birthday gift was the suit I was wearing (well, scratch that, _worn)_ and the dinner we just went to, because at that point her job was generating twice as much revenue as mine. No, the head and the sex and the fact that we were doing this on the kitchen floor meant exactly what it was supposed to.

_This is your night. I'm going to make sure you fucking enjoy it. We'll worry about me some other time._

It went fast, alright. I wouldn't have minded a few more minutes of her down on me, but once I'd entered her the feelings of last time all came rushing back to me. And then I realized, _it might be my birthday. But I'll only enjoy this if she does too._

So I pulled out. "C'mon," I whispered, taking her hand. It wasn't fair that she had her back against the hard floor. "Let's move this to the couch."

So we did.

Granted, it was still all about me. I was on top, I was the one screaming, and I was the one that practically muffled her cries with pillows. But this wasn't only birthday sex. And when it was over and when I held her after, I knew. I was stroking her blonde hair. We fell asleep one on top of the other, only partially dressed with our limbs still intertwined. We would wake up sore and creaky the next morning from the awkward positions we were sleeping in, but it was worth it.

I knew I wouldn't have enjoyed tonight with anyone other than her. And I'm not just talking about the sex.

XXX

A/N: Again, so sorry for how late this chapter ran! Hopefully a hearty 3K and a leeeettle more explicit lemon at the end made up for it. My life has been fairly off schedule lately what with summer and all, but as I move closer to the school year and get more of a structure, updates should be pretty regular again. (I work backwards. The more I have on my plate, the more non-priorities I get accomplished xD)

I kid, I kid—this fic is definitely a priority, and I'm making it my priority to see it finished (even though, as of right now, that's a lonnnnnng ways away.) Cross Country and school _will _be big things for me this year (Junior year. It's either death or death), but I'm determined to stay on track with _Reach. _I'm really starting to love how it's turning out, and I hope you guys are too xx

All the best,

Vikki


	14. What was Missing

A/N: I am so, _so _sorry for how long this chapter took. I'm three weeks into my Junior year of high school and it's already been kicking my ass. I'm going to try to put myself back on a schedule for this fic, because I'm really getting into it and I would love you guys to see how it fleshes out.

I especially like this chapter. Enjoy!

Blessings,

Nina (I'll start going with my real name now. Why not? :D)

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Fourteen

_What was Missing_

I don't throw the word "love" around lightly. Maybe I did when I was younger, but after my last serious girlfriend in high school, I basically had it figured out. Breaking up with Tara was a game-changer, and, okay, I'd be lying if I said it wasn't for the fact that she was the first girl I fucked. Yeah, I'm definitely that stereotypical sex-before-love douchebag.

But anyway.

My elementary school self—

"I love Carly Shay."

My high school self—

"I love Tara."

Both of those now have _huge _asterisks next to them.

"I love Carly Shay."*

*Okay, so this is kind of true. Carly was more than a decent human being back them, she was probably one of the nicest people I'd ever met, and she was definitely attractive enough, and we practically grew up together and watched each other blossom through our awkward phases, and we could both be each other's buffers when Sam's antics were too much, _**BUT,**_ what was there, really? Where's the substance? Of course I fell in love with my neighbor when I was twelve years old, any other twelve year old boy would do that when you're growing up in the vicinity of an acne/braces/glasses free, relatively normal girl. But "perfect" isn't everything it's cut out to be.

Bitch.

"I love Tara."*

*You were the first girl to let me stick my dick in your hole. Of course I fell in love with you.

Alright, so maybe I'm not being entirely fair to Tara. (Same goes for Carly, but after everything that's happened with her I don't give a shit as to how fair I am.) Because when I was "in love" with them, nothing was wrong with them. They were both well adjusted, perfectly likable human beings. But it wasn't love.

So what was missing?

XXX

"Freddie, if I have to listen to my phone go off one more time—"

"_Where the hell are you?"_

"Calm down—"

"Sam, if you went on a run, I swear to god—"

"Oh my god, relax, I didn't. If it's really that important, I'm at the gyno's."

"Wait, what?" My heart skipped a beat. "You're not getting an STD check, are you?"

She snorted. _"No._" I heard a slurping sound and just about hit my head against a wall. Yeah, there wasn't any phone call in the world that would make Sam put her milkshake/smoothie/whatever the hell she was drinking down. After a thoughtful pause she added, "But is there any reason for me to?"

"What, no!" Then I thought for a second. "At least I don't think so . . ."

She was probably rolling her eyes at me by now. "Nice."

"What d'you need at the gyno's? Don't you have work this morning?"

"Yeah, I called in sick. I'm getting a new birth control prescription."

"Why—" then I shut up right away, flashing back to last night and the other time we wound up too wrapped up in the heat of the moment to bother with a condom. "Nevermind. I get it."

There was some muffled laughing on the other end, and then a distinctive choking sound.

"You okay?"

"Went down the wrong pipe," she coughed out.

"You _would _drink a milkshake and talk on the phone with me."

"Yeah, well-I have to go," she responded abruptly, "they called my name. Don't miss me too much, Benson."

"Okay." I thought for a second. _Should I say it?_

_ Yeah, whatever. I'll say it._

"Sam?"

"Hm?"

"I love you."

She laughed. "I'll see you later." Click.

XXX

So what was missing?

There was no question about it. I was in love with Sam. It wasn't even that I was a particular romantic, or that it was something I told myself hoping that it would make me believe it. It was a fact. It was a fact I'd spent weeks running away from, so coming to terms with it was both relieving and terrifying.

I'm in love with her.

_Congratufuckinglations. Finally._

I'm in love with her.

_What the hell did you just get yourself into, Benson._

Late August became September, and every day we spent together seemed to stretch longer and longer. We weren't defined in the slightest, but we would kiss and touch and, on occasion, wind up on the floor with our clothes half off. But when we weren't fooling around, there was also a change in the weather. She'd let me put my arm around her when she was watching TV. She'd tell me about her bitchy boss when we cleaned up the dishes. I remember her telling me one night in bed, on a night where both of us were too wiped to do anything except sleep, "I still think about her all the time."

I didn't have to ask who she was talking about. "You shouldn't."

"But I do."

"Sam—"

"We were friends for years, you can't fucking expect me to forget that."

"I don't." I pulled her close, "But she's a skeleton in both of our closets." I searched her expressions, and without her having to say anything, I knew what she wanted to hear. "I'm sorry."

She didn't cry. But she did kiss me, and once she pulled away she said, "Goodnight, Freddie."

Oh, I knew what'd been missing with Carly and Tara. And I wasn't missing anything here.

XXX

The morning Sam could run was a breezy morning in early September. She jumped out of bed, and the sound of her feet hitting the ground was loud enough to wake me up.

"What the hell—"

I've never seen someone rummage around their drawers as fast as she did. She was blowing her hair out of her face, and I could tell from her expression she couldn't wait to get on the roads.

"Well, someone's excited. Can I come with you?"

"No!" She was attempting to get into her shoes and put on her sports bra at the same time. "You're slow. I'm going hard today, man."

"Well, don't do an eighty miler."

She ran out of the room, shoelaces untied and everything. She took one look back, gave me a devilish smile and said, "No promises."

The door slammed shut as I caught one last glimpse at her blonde curls. Then I took one look at the floor and marveled at the mess she'd just made.

Yeah, I loved her. But even the most epic love in the world wouldn't have made me groan.

_"Sam!"_

I rolled my eyes, reaching down and picking up her sports bras by my pinky. They were literally strewn _everywhere—_on the floor, on the bed, _under _the bed—

Then I caught a glimpse of a loose paper under the bed. Hang on.

I picked it up. No, it wasn't mine. It must've fallen out of Sam's drawers in the hurry she was in. It was addressed to her. I rolled my eyes. _Probably a letter from some guy that she didn't want me to know about._

But I took another glimpse. The return address was from NYU.

"What the fuck—"

Okay, so what I did was a complete violation of her privacy, there's no way around it. I ripped the envelope open then and there, and sitting barely dressed at the foot of my bed, I read every word of that letter. And the entire time I did, I kept telling myself, _there's no fucking way. This can't be right._

But as I read it again, the gears starting turning in my head. Colleges. East coast. How cryptic she was.

I didn't realize how many times I'd read that letter until I heard the door swing open as Sam came back from her run.

"No, I _didn't_ do eighty miles—" she started, but as she walked into the bedroom and saw the look on my face and what I was holding in my hand, she stopped short.

"NYU?" I asked, breathlessly.

"Where the fuck did you find that?" She tried snatching it out of my hand, but I jerked away fast enough.

"I found it in the mess you made." I watched her face go from a post-run flush to a full on, beet red grimace. "Why didn't you tell me about this?"

"Freddie, this isn't any of your—"

"No, don't say that, it's completely my business."

"High school was such a long time ago, it's really not that big of a deal anymore—"

"_Then why did you keep this for so long?"_

She clamped her mouth shut. Silence.

"Explain." I sat down on the foot of my (scratch that, our) bed and crossed my arms. "Now."

I expected the Samantha Puckett usual, which was the rebuttal and the pout and the 'I won't fucking do what you say, you're not the boss of me.' But one look at her face and I knew that I wasn't going to get that from her.

She started by taking the letter back. "Alright, fine. I wasn't a complete mess in the making. Senior year of High School, I got accepted into college."

"You didn't just get into college, you got a _full ride—"_

"For fucking film school!" she said, throwing her hands up. She rolled her eyes. "They knew me from iCarly, they figured they could use some comedic talent, whatever. I honestly don't give a shit anymore."

"So why keep the letter?"

Her lips became very thin as she folded it back up, putting it into her underwear drawer. She looked at me and evenly said, "I said _anymore. _You weren't the only one with a college dream, Freddie."

And all of the sudden, all I could think of myself was, _you stupid little prick. _That was such a long time ago, and the details of Spencer's aftermath were hazy to begin with. But there were two things I could remember clearly from when Carly made her request—it was my sheer terror and onslaught dread of not being able to go to the school of my dreams, and Sam's complete willingness to stay behind and help. I didn't even bother to think of what she was giving up, I was so wrapped up in my own problems.

Sam, it turned out, was the most selfless of us all.

"And you gave it up for her?" I asked.

She snorted. "C'mon. Friends first, there's no way around that."

And now I knew what we were both thinking. "I wonder what was running through Carly's head when she was hooking up with Tyler, then," I said hollowly.

I didn't have to worry about her getting upset, because I could tell this was something she'd thought about a million times before. As if Carly's betrayal wasn't bad enough, this letter set it in stone for me. The girl wasn't any run on the mill bitch—she was a monster.

"Did she know about NYU?" I asked Sam, pointing at the letter.

Sam had locked her gaze into mine, so when she looked at what I was pointing at she seemed almost startled. "NYU? Oh, hell no. No one knew."

"Why?"

She shrugged. "Didn't seem like a big deal."

I rolled my eyes. "You mean it didn't seem like it would be a big deal to us, right?"

The look on her face was downright bewildered, but I'd been living with the girl for close to two months, so at this point that'd been happening a lot lately. We were picking up on each other's cues. She would say something, and I could tell what she really meant. _Didn't seem like such a big deal._ Pfft, was that a lie. It was probably Sam's biggest accomplishment, and the afternoon that letter came in the mail, I bet she drunk herself silly out of happiness and cried whenever she looked at the return address—

And that's when I stopped cold, and dropped my gaze from Sam's.

I'd finally figured her out.

"You and Carly were so wrapped up in your own college shit," Sam continued, "Mine didn't seem like it meant anything."

I nodded slowly. I went over to the bed, sitting down next to her at the foot of it.

"Question," I started. She turned to face me. "If you could do it over—would you?"

She paused. "You mean, if I could go to college?"

I nodded.

She didn't say anything for a minute, and it took me a second before I realized why. "Take this mess out of the equation—" I said quickly, "the one where we're living together and having to sort out all of this emotional stuff. Not if you could have a do-over for the last two months, but for the start of the last five years, would you take it?"

"I get what you're saying," she said. She sighed. "Honestly . . . I think I would." She shrugged. "Too late now, so whatever. 'Sides, I can't stand the idea of being on camera ever again. But stopping that whole thing with Tyler and Carly from happening? Yeah, I would go to college any day."

I nodded. She noted my silence and turned to me.

"Freddie?"

"Mhm?"

"Would you do over the last two months?"

My heart dropped. This kind of confrontation wasn't Sam's style at all. That's what the old, ignorant Freddie was saying. But something inside me (the better part of me, I'd come to realize), was nodding his head and going, _this is exactly Sam's style. She's just always been too scared to show it._

And I knew she was scared of my answer more than I was scared of her question.

_Would you do over the last two months?_

"Hey," I said, getting up from the bed. "Give me twenty minutes, okay?" Her jaw dropped in disbelief, so I put my hands on her shoulders and told her, "I'll answer your question, let me go so I can answer it, I have to get something. Okay?"

Without waiting for her response, I turned on my heel and bolted out of our apartment. I could just make out the sound of her screaming behind me,

"_If you fucking leave me hanging like that ever again-!"_

The door slammed shut. One thing resonated in my head.

_You're in love with her, Freddie._

XXX

"Two tickets for _The Savior_, please_."_

I saw a hint of a smile creep on the guy's face. "Sold out," he said, folding his hands.

"Really?"

"Mhm."

"Is there a ten PM showing?"

He sighed, looking at the computer monitor and then going, "Well, there is, but it's opening weekend and it's only the most hyped movie of the year. You're better off seeing _Wake of Summer _and leaving _The Savior _for next week, if you ask me."

I felt like rolling my eyes, but it seemed kind of douchey, considering the zitty-faced teenager working the ticket stand was taking his sweet time with me. I knew his type—he had the rounded classes, pale skin, and scrawny look about him. I was that kid all of seven years ago.

"Isn't _Wake of Summer _the new Jennifer Lawrence movie?"

"Yeah."

"Something less rom-comy, maybe?"

He laughed. "Why, you didn't like her in _Hunger Games_?" he kicked back in his chair, smiling.

I opened my mouth, but heard a voice interject behind me.

"_Wake of Summer _is _so _different from _Hunger Games."_

I turned around, and had to blink a few times to make sure I was seeing straight. The girl had a coy smile on her face. "It's really witty, definitely more com than rom. You'd like it, Freddie."

"Hey," I paused, "I know you."

I couldn't place the face at first—it was like seeing someone on the street from high school that'd gained a lot of weight. But this wasn't any overweight old classmate of mine—she had pin-straight, platinum blonde hair, a strong nose and a rack to boot.

"Freddie Benson, from iCarly," she said.

That's when I remembered. "I met you at Aztec that night! You gave me your card."

"Alessandra," she reminded me, "in case you'd forgotten." She shifted her weight. "How've you been? You guys haven't done a show in a while."

"Yeah, things got . . . complicated." The memories from that night I'd tried to block out, since that was the night when Carly and Tyler's affair had been revealed. She was the girl I'd hit on at the bar. I turned back to ticket salesman, needing a change of subject. "I'll take her word for it and go with _Wake of Summer_, then."

He smiled. "Gotchya." He handed the tickets back to me, and Alessandra stepped up.

"What're you seeing?" I asked her.

"Just picking up my tickets for _The Savior," _she said, "I'm seeing it tomorrow." She took them from the stand, thanked the salesman, and we both started walking out. "Honestly, Freddie, you should get back to iCarly. I know a lot of people really miss it."

"Things with Carly have been rocky," I said bluntly.

She turned to me, scanned my expression, took the cue and nodded. "Well, we all know rocky. But hopefully you're okay?"

I smiled. _Hahhhh,_ I felt like telling her, _I'm in a semi-romantic, semi-sexual relationship with my ex-arch-enemy-turned-best-friend-since-high-school. _"Just going along for the crazy ride right now," I admitted, "but things've definitely been worse. What about you?"

"I'm moving!" she exclaimed. "I just closed the deal on my apartment, I'm here for another week before I head back east."

"I'm assuming this is a good thing?"

She snorted. "_Hell _yes. I moved out here for _le douche, _and I'm going home for me."

"Good for you, then. Where you headed?"

"Back to New York," she told me. "I landed a pretty kick-ass job, I work as a realtor and I'll get to sell those _huge _penthouses down on Park Avenue, so I'm stoked to be heading back."

We walked back in the direction of my apartment, making small talk. It was during my conversation with Alessandra that I realized how little interaction I'd had with people other than Sam in the last two months. Considering I'd met Alessandra at a bar where she was basically half-dressed, our conversation couldn't have been tamer. She was wearing a cardigan and jeans, her hair up in a ponytail and only the smallest trace of makeup. The blonde Barbie I'd met two months ago transformed into a typical girl right before my eyes, and talking to her was, well, normal.

We hit a corner, and she pointed to the left, while I waited for the light. "My apartment is back this way," she told me.

"Yeah, I'm going straight."

"Okay." She gave me a smile, taking a step back. "Hey, it was nice bumping into you, Freddie."

"Yeah, you too."

"You still have my card?"

I didn't even have to rack my brain to answer that question. "No," I admitted with a laugh, "I don't think so."

"Well, give me your phone."

I handed it over to her, and she punched in her number. "I'm changing apartments in, like, five minutes anyway, so here's my cell. Let me know if you're ever in New York, okay?" She thought for a second before adding, "From one friend to another."

And that's when I breathed a mental sigh of relief, because Alessandra was exactly _not_ what I'd pegged her to be the night I met her. Yeah, so she might've been looking for some distraction sex—what else could you ask from a girl going through a breakup? But that wasn't all there was to her. Maybe at the time she wanted to get it in, but now, it wasn't about that at all.

I gave her a smile and a wave. "I'll take you up on that," I said. "Have a good night."

"You too, man."

She turned on her heel and walked away. I was left with my phone and two movie tickets, which I turned my attention back to.

"Alright," I said to myself, "Let's do this."

XXX

I walked back into the apartment, and she was fuming. Well, maybe not _fuming_—I'm sure she'd cooled off enough to take it down to "simmering"—but I opened the door to crossed-arms and a pissed-off expression.

"Hey," I said. "Before you attack me—"

"You're _impossible!"_ she shouted, but she said in a way that I knew she was kidding. I pulled what I was holding out from behind my back, and whatever profanities she was about to shout at me were stopped short.

Two movie tickets and a bouquet of flowers were what I was holding in my hands.

"What the hell—"

"To answer your question," I said, walking closer to her, "About whether or not I would do the last two months over? Yeah, honestly, I would." I watched her expression turn into a scowl. "And I don't mean that in the way you'd think."

"How—"

"I'd do it _right_," I said to her. "I'd take you out to dinner and we'd go through the motions of dating like _normal _adults, because goddamnit, that's what I want."

She looked at the flowers. "Something's telling me that it's not too late for that now, right?"

"No," I said, firmly. I held out the flowers. "How does dinner and a movie sound tonight? No pressure, no emotional crap about Carly or Tyler or whatever, and I'll pay. Just you and me being our normal selves."

I saw the ghost of a smile stretch on her face. "We're hardly normal, Freddie."

"That's why I like you."

She looked at the flowers and the tickets, and then back at my face. What I was doing was risky, and I knew that. Sam and I were the farthest thing from compatible. We bickered on a regular and living with her was a thrill ride in itself.

But, hey. We felt something for each other.

"Alright," she said, taking the flowers from my hands. She looked me in the eye. "A normal date, right?"

"Right."

"Dinner and a movie?"

"Be ready at seven."

She paused. "Is this theoretically our first date?"

"Well, if we're speaking theoretically, then I guess."

She thoughtfully added, "So if we fuck later, that would _basically _be like fucking on the first date—"

"Oh, shut _up, _you perv."

We both laughed. I gave her a kiss, and I plopped down in front of the TV while she ran to the shower, finally getting a chance to wash off the grime from her run.

"First Date." _Hahh!_

"It's about fucking time," I muttered under my breath.

XXX

_Wake of Summer_ was alright at best, the restaurant we ate at was mediocre, and the entire time we were out that night, I couldn't help but flashback to some of my dates with Tara. Tara was my first, and, well, _only_ real girlfriend. It's not that I missed her or was thinking about her as anything more than an ex-girlfriend, but through the entire movie when I had my arm around Sam, I was thinking, _I took Tara on these kinds of dates. This was what we did every Saturday night for eight months._

A B-list movie and an okay dinner were so much better with Sam.

That shouldn't come as a surprise, but about halfway through dinner, I looked up at her and something clicked. You'd think living under the same roof as her for two months would make me know her like the back of my hand. But now I saw in Sam what I'd never seen in Tara or Carly or anyone else before.

"Hey," I cut in, interrupting her mid-sentence. "This is nice."

Her face flushed the smallest bit, but she masked it with a smirk. "Oh really?"

"Really. We should do this more often."

She opened her mouth to say something, but then shut it, probably remembering a few of our golden rules for the night. _No talking about where we stand. No talking about any emotional shit. Absolutely no talking about Carly, Tyler, or Spencer._

"I wouldn't be opposed to that," she said after a minute. She gave me a smile—a genuine one this time—and I returned it, and it was exactly what I needed to see.

I don't usually believe in romantic crap, and that one person can make all the difference. That idea died with my schoolboy crush on Carly. But now I was starting to buy into again, because Sam and I had a chemistry I couldn't make sense of.

We kept talking. We talked through the night, and the restaurant had to kick us out when it closed.

"Favorite movie?" she asked.

"All three _Back to the Futures. _And maybe the _Dark Knight. _Favorite song?"

"Anything by Coldplay."

"Really? You don't strike me as a Coldplay girl."

"Well, I am. What about you, Fredward?"

"How about calling me by my real name."

"_Freddie."_

I smiled. _"Fix You _by Coldplay."

"Shut up."

"I'm not making this up!" I thought for a second. "But I also like Daughtry."

"Yeah, _September_ is a good song."

The endless small talk went on and on. "Favorite food?" "Lamb and gravy. Favorite place in the world?" "Anywhere sunny. What about you?" "I like cities, but that's just me."

We held hands walking up to our apartment. Standing outside the door, I looked her in the eyes. I kissed her on the lips, close-mouthed and softly.

"I had a great time tonight," I told her.

She laughed. "You're such a sap."

"Yeah, well, our 'first date' is over. We can go back to our usual dysfunctional selves now."

"Who says I wasn't being myself tonight?"

"Oh no, you were. We just made an effort to not give each other hell."

We laughed walking into the apartment. We wound up kissing on the couch, and moving that to the bed. And all the while, we were talking in between every kiss, either whispering something sweet or joking around in the other person's ear.

How we ever got to that point, I'll never know. Our history was so rocky considering where we were then and there, kissing on the bed and wrapped up in each other. That almost made it all the sweeter.

Whether we had sex that night, I can't even remember. All I know is that we woke up to the sound of knocking on our apartment door the next morning. Sam barely reacted, groggy with her head nestled in my chest.

"Who the hell would that be?" I groaned.

"Answer it," she said, half-asleep.

I sighed. I rolled out of bed and walked to the door wearing only sweatpants. _It's probably my mom,_ I figured. I hadn't seen her in a while. Or maybe it was Sam's mom, or Melanie. Or a friend of ours from work.

I swung the door open. Carly Shay was staring back at me.

XXX

A/N: . . . dun dun dun!

Those of you that figured Carly wasn't gone for good totally called it. I promise I won't go a super long stretch of time without updating, we're hitting a pivotal plot point and I want to have you guys see how this fleshes out ASAP.

I've had this fic planned out for literally a year. I promise I'm not making it up as I go along, I already know what the last lines of this story are going to be and every major plottwist from here on out. I'm sorry I don't update as frequently as I'd like to, I swear it's not laziness or writer's block, it's honestly just been lack of time and a busy schedule on my part. But chapter fifteen will be here very soon, promise.

xoxo

Nina


	15. Seattle

_Reach For Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Fifteen

_Seattle_

My first instinct was to slam the door in her face. My second was to scream. I opted for the former, because my voice wasn't warmed up for the day yet, and there wasn't enough screaming in the world for this one girl.

"Freddie, wait!" she shouted as I shoved the door. She pushed back against it, struggling to keep it open. "Please just listen to me!"

"Fuck off."

"Just give me five minutes, I need to talk to you—"

"Freddie?"

I stopped short, hearing the voice behind me. Sam was out of bed, groggy and wearing only panties and one of my old shirts. I turned around to let the image of her sink in, and as I did, the door swung open and Carly stumbled into my apartment.

Sam's eyes widened. Her and Carly looked each other in the eye for the first time in two months.

"Sam," Carly said, her voice uneven.

Before Sam could throw any punches or break any windows, I snapped awake, running over to Carly and grabbing her by the arm. "Get out. Now. You're not welcome here."

"If you would just let me explain—"

"You have nothing to explain!" I shouted. I shoved her out the doorframe. "What's done is done, leave and if you _ever _come back here again—"

"Spencer!" Carly shouted as I slammed the door. "It's about Spencer!"

My spell of rage was broken at the mention of him. I turned to Sam, both of us wild-eyed and shaken.

Sam pointed at the door. "Answer it." Her voice was unnaturally high.

"But—"

She nodded firmly. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes, opening them as she walked over to the door and threw it open.

_"What?"_ she demanded, facing her former best friend.

Shocked at this, Carly could barely hold up her hand to give us the envelopes she had with her with her. Sam snatched it and handed it to me, and I ripped it open on the spot. As I did, Carly started babbling.

"I swear, I completely forgot about this, but I found this right after he died . . ."

I pulled out a wad of cash. Every bill in there was one hundred dollars. The name written on the envelope, clearly written in Spencer's scrawl, was "Freddie."

" . . . when I was cleaning out his stuff I found the money, I put it away and just found it again recently—"

"_Ten thousand dollars?"_ I said, staring at the money in my hands.

She nodded. The look on her face was dead terrified. "For both of you," she managed.

I wordlessly gave Sam the envelope with her name written on it. She flipped through it, and looked up at me.

And, at the same second, we both snapped.

"You _bitch—"_

_ "You kept this from us for five and a half years?"_

"I swear, I forgot all about the money!" Carly screamed, holding her hands up in defense. "I'd never withhold that from you!"

"Just like you'd never betray your best friend, right?" Sam spat at her. Normally I would hold her back from starting a fight, but I let her lunge forward and reach out across the doorframe. She grabbed at Carly.

"Listen, Sam—"

"I trusted you!" The look on Sam's face was absolutely murderous. "You didn't ruin my life, but you damn sure ruined yours, because I don't see how _anyone _will ever want you after what you did!"

Sam got to her, alright. It didn't need to be said, but it was clear—the one thing Carly wanted more than anything in the world, and the one thing Sam and I had given her for five years, was the feeling of being wanted. We'd given her attention.

And now, Sam was telling her it was something she'd never get again.

"I'm sorry!" she spluttered. Tears were spilling from her eyes, and she was clinging on desperately to Sam. "You're right, you're so right. And I'm s-s-sorry."

Sam pushed her away. There was no sign of remorse in her eyes, only anger. "If you think you can buy back our friendship, Carly, then you're sadly mistaken." She shoved her out through the door. "Now get the hell out of my house."

And in that split-second, Carly went from spluttering and upset to hysterical. _"Is that what you're playing at!?" _Her shrieks were bloodcurdling. She motioned her hands to Sam's panties and shirt. _"Fucking FREDDIE?"_

Sam slammed the door in her face.

_"YOU TWO LIVING TOGETHER IS THE WORST MISTAKE YOU'LL EVER MAKE! DON'T COME CRYING TO ME WHEN YOU HATE EACH OTHER!"_

_Carly's being hysterical. She's emotionally wounded and that's why she's having this outburst._

That's what I kept telling myself. But in the back of my head, alarms were going off-

-No. Stop, Freddie. You can't think like that.

Sam turned to me, fuming and clutching on to her envelope for dear life. She looked me in the eye, didn't say a word, and stormed into the bedroom.

"Sam-"

She opened the drawers in a haste, fishing out a sports bra and shorts. "I can't deal with this right now," she said, throwing her envelope onto the bed.

"Sam, _stop."_

She looked up to face me. Her face was flushed, and whether she was trying not to cry or scream, I couldn't tell.

So I looked her in the eye and said, "We'll work this out, okay? I promise."

"How are we ever going to work this out!?" she exclaimed. "Just as we start to move on with our lives, she crops back up! We can't keep her out—"

"Then we'll just have to find a way to."

"_How?"_

Thinking for a second, nothing came to me. "I don't know," I sighed, defeated. "But we'll think of something." I motioned towards her sneakers, sitting in the corner. "Go on your run, give me some time to brainstorm."

"Freddie—"

"Sam, you need to let off some steam, and I need to wrap my head around what we're about to do." The realization dawned on me, and the words were coming out of my mouth before I could stop them. "Because we can't keep living like this."

She sighed, looking down at her shoes. We both knew I was right. "Okay," she said. She walked out of the room and shut the door to our apartment behind her, leaving me alone to think of an answer.

_Living together is the worst mistake you'll ever make._

It was weird how much of an effect that sentence had on me. Because through everything that'd happened between me and Sam in the last two months, no one was really around to witness it. The friends we kept in touch with from high school were far and few, and the people we saw on a regular basis were co-workers. I didn't know Sam's, and she didn't know mine. The basis of our entire relationship had gone un-judged and, well, private.

_Carly's judgment doesn't mean anything, _I told myself. _She was upset. That's why she said it._

It kept nagging at me, thought. She knew us best and she knew us the longest. My heart skipped a beat as I thought of it. _If _Sam and I had been dating in high school, would that have been Carly's reaction? Would she have told us that we were making a mistake? Clearly she wouldn't have screamed it a closed door, because since I was thinking hypothetically, we would've been on good terms with her.

Carly was a lot of things in high school, and she certainly is a lot of things now. I used to think "honest" was one of them, which didn't turn out to be the case. But "perceptive" definitely is. Especially when it came to me and Sam. Carly Shay was a good judge of character, there was no way around it.

I pushed the paranoia out of my head. All the time Sam and I had been 'together,' if you could even call it that much, I never really questioned whether or not we were right for each other. What I felt for her was enough for me.

_Let it keep being enough,_ I told myself. To hell with Carly. Her opinion didn't mean anything. At least that's what my twenty-three year old self thought.

I'm thirty five years old now, and this entire thing has played out. I know what happened. And the reason I'm sitting in this coffee shop and ditching work is because I don't have the answer to one thing I've been wondering every day for the last ten years—

Was it all a mistake?

_Stay in the story, Freddie, _I thought. I couldn't answer that question just yet. I wasn't done re-living my story.

So back to being twenty-three and in the midst of the drama Carly had just created, I sat at the foot of my bed, thinking. I thought about Sam. I thought about us. I thought about Carly, and the hold she had on our lives. Whether or not she was right or wrong about me and Sam, it was impossible to deny—she affected both of us in ways we couldn't handle.

And then I heard a crack of thunder, and just about lost it.

_"I fucking hate Seattle!"_

I looked out the window, and watched the pouring rain. The city was gray, as always. The city was gray and rainy and lifeless and cold and all around _depressing. _Early September was beautiful in some parts of America, but sure as hell not Seattle.

I was used to it, obviously. I'd lived in Seattle my whole life, so I'd gotten used to the rain and the cold and the grayness of it all—

Wait.

God, holy _shit_.

My heart started racing, because I knew I had the answer. I had the answer to our problem with Carly, which was basically the answer to our problem with everything. So as Sam walked through the door, I didn't even give her time to shower the mud off the backs of her legs.

"Let's leave."

Sam stopped short, shocked. "What?"

"Let's leave, there's no reason for us to be in Seattle anymore."

I could tell this was taking a while register. "You mean leave town?"

"Yeah," I said, hearing the excitement creep into my voice, "Think about it: the only reason we stayed was to help Carly. We stayed to keep iCarly going, but now iCarly's done, so what's the point?"

If I was talking to anyone else in the world, they would've rejected this so fast. But I was talking to Sam, the most fearless person I'd ever met. "Pack up and leave everything behind," she said slowly, "including our past."

I nodded. "We're holding on to way too much here. And not just Carly—"

"—but Tyler, Spencer, our show . . ." she was nodding along with me. "Oh my god." She looked up at me. "How have we never thought of this?"

"We never got the chance to leave for college, so we can take it now."

But then Sam groaned and went, "Shit! No, we can't leave town."

"Why not?"

"We can barely pay our bills, Freddie, how are we going to afford moving?"

Fuck. She was right. The excitement wore off the second she said that, because I should've known my entire idea was too good to be true. Still, I persisted. "Well, we don't have to go far—"

"No." Her voice was stern. "There's no point unless we go far, as far away as possible from Carly."

"But we can't take our lives across the country, it's way too expensive—"

And that's when Sam's eyes widened. She scrambled forward, reaching for something on my bed.

The envelopes.

"Not with twenty-thousand dollars!" Her exclamation came out like a cheer, and she eyed the money like it was a holy grail.

I could see it right now. This is what Sam needed—this is what she'd been waiting for all along, and idea she didn't knew she had until now. And now that I saw the look in her eyes, I realized it myself.

We could leave. We could start over.

Her energy about it was infectious, and before I knew it my legs were shaking with her's, because, _damnit, _this was _it. _We were starting a new life and it was possible. We were going to leave behind all of the pain and memories of Seattle.

"No more Carly," she said.

"No more skeletons in our closests."

"No more being recognized on the street as the local webstars—"

And that was when the hollering began. She broke into a grin. She impulsively threw her arms around me, kissed me, and the rest of the day was history because we were celebrating, high on the excitement of the idea that all of our problems were over.

Obviously, we didn't know the logistics. We didn't know where we were going or when we were leaving, but that didn't matter because we going to fly _far _from this miserable city and Carly Shay.

We were entering a chapter in our lives we should've started five years ago. We were leaving home.

XXX

Clearly there was a flaw in our plan. We had no idea where to start.

The excitement of our big revelation (operation "leave Seattle" as we dubbed it) didn't wear off entirely after the first day, but being faced with the realities of it dampened our spirits.

First off, we didn't know where to go. The western seaboard was out of the question ("way too close to here," we decided immediately), but the farthest east either of us had ever been was New Mexico, except for the one time I'd toured MIT. We threw around ideas for a few days, which was fun until we looked at the prices. That and we never seemed to come to an agreement.

"What about Miami? You said you wanted to go somewhere sunny, right?"

"Yeah, _sunny_, not suffocating and humid. I was thinking Austin."

"You're kidding. We wouldn't be able to deal with those accents."

"Okay, snobby, any better ideas?"

"DC?"

She laughed. "Of all the cities America has to offer, you'd _really _have DC as one of your top picks?"

"Well, excuse me for wanting to be patriotic."

That's a summary of our arguments in a nutshell. We were trying to keep things playful and laidback, but on the inside, both of us were freaking out. We'd lived in the same place our entire lives. If paying our bills was stressful, then moving across the country was something else completely.

Okay, so we didn't disagree on everything. Aspen, Honolulu, and Atlanta were our top picks. But once we tried tracking down apartments, each of those cities was more expensive than the next.

One week went by. Then two. The initial excitement was long gone—now there was anxiety just to _leave_, because damnit, the opportunity had presented itself and we both wanted to get a move on.

And the realization hit me one day.

Sam and I were out for a morning run. We passed the office of Driscoll and Co., where most of Seattle's local realtors were based in. A combination of that and watching Sam's blonde hair bounce in the wind led to the epiphany that would change our lives.

"Mother-!"

Okay. So it also led to me faceplanting onto the ground.

"Damnit, Freddie, you're such a klutz!" she snapped. Sam got a little (make that a lot) impatient mid-run.

But I didn't listen to her. I fumbled around for my cellphone, always keeping it on me because that was a habit my mom had taught me that had yet to die. I scrolled through my contacts, finding the name 'Alessandra.'

"What are you doing?" Sam asked.

"I just remembered something." The other line was ringing. "There's this girl I met, she just got a job working as a realtor in New York—"

"New York?"

I nodded, and Sam took a minute to let that sink in. New York was the one city we hadn't even mentioned, strictly because living there was so outrageously expensive, and, okay, because it was the avenue Sam could've taken that'd never worked out. At least that's why I never brought it up.

She shook her head. "You're out of your mind, prices in Atlanta were bad enough, there's no way in hell—"

"Hello?"

"Alessandra, hi!" I said loudly. Sam clamped her mouth shut. "It's Freddie."

"Freddie?"

"From iCarly."

"Ohhhh! Hey Freddie, how are you?"

"Great! Hey, listen, I remember you telling me about New York . . ." I rattled off the facts from there, asked her how her new job was treating her, and then got right into it. I needed an apartment, the cheapest thing she could find me in the safest neighborhood possible. "I know you said you got a gig selling penthouses—"

"Yeah, Freddie," she sighed, "I'm not exactly studio savvy."

_Damn, _I thought. There went the New York idea.

". . . but I think you might be in luck," she added thoughtfully. "A good friend of mine does lower-end sales, he could help you out."

My heart skipped a beat. "Could I get in contact with him?"

"Sure! Gimme a sec, I'll pull up his info . . ."

I was jarred away from our conversation by the sound of Sam tapping her foot, and I looked up and realized I still hadn't given her an answer. She was getting impatient. _Who the hell are you talking to? New York City? Are you out of your fucking mind?_

"Got it!" Alessandra exclaimed. "James Weiss, born and raised New Yorker, knows the area like the back of his hand. I'll text you his number?"

"Sounds great." I breathed a sigh of relief. "Thank you so, so much, Alessandra."

"Sandra, Freddie." We were three thousand miles apart, but I could see the smirk she was wearing. "Call me Sandra. And you're welcome."

I hung up. Sam looked at me, exasperated.

"What the hell just happened?" she demanded.

"Hear me out, okay—"

"Freddie, who the fuck is Alessandra?"

I took in her expression, and it surprised me. Then I laughed. "Calm down, I barely know her; I met her at Aztec a couple of months ago, she knew me from iCarly and we've bumped into each other since."

"But how did she—"

"She moved here from New York, she's a realtor there—damnit, does it matter?" I felt my heart race. "I . . . I think I just got us an apartment in New York city."

She stared at me, dumbfounded. "You're bullshitting me."

"I'm not."

"Freddie—"

"I'm serious, Sam. This is happening."

I braced myself, because Sam's expression was so stunned I couldn't tell if she was excited or pissed off.

"Well? What d'you think?" I asked, getting impatient. "Is this a good thing? Because—"

Before I could say anything else, she flung her arms around me. "A good thing!? Of fucking _course _it's a good thing! Ah!" She pulled back, smiling. Then she gave me a slap across the face.

"_Ow!"_

_"That's _for picking up some random girl's number—" then she kissed me on the lips, "and that's for getting us a place in the best city in the world."

XXX

It was too good to be true, but it was happening.

The next two weeks were a blur of packing and playing phone tag with James, who proved to be the opposite of Sandra—completely laid back, and a touch serious. He scored us an apartment in Greenwich Village. The place was small, yeah, but it was located in the heart of New York.

And from there on out, all of our problems were suspended. We laughed more, we enjoyed each other more. We went out on dates, and we had fun in our last few nights in Seattle. We had more sex, and _better _sex, and on our last night as we lay tangled up in sheets, she turned to me and said,

"I'm so excited to start over."

"Yeah. It's kind of scary though."

"I know."

"New city, new people . . ."

"Well, let's be real. We're not leaving anyone behind here."

I shrugged. "True." I thought of my mom, fleetingly, but I'd already decided I'd give her the memo once I was on the Atlantic Coast. She still didn't know Sam and I were living together, much less moving across the country. That bit of information would be enough to give her a heart attack.

"Well, I'm excited," I said to her.

"Me too." She smiled at me, and put her hand on the back of my neck. "I'm . . ." Her throat went dry, and I could tell that whatever she was trying to say she'd have to choke out, "I'm glad I'm doing this with you."

Hearing that come out of her mouth felt better than the day I got my acceptance letter to MIT. I hoped I wasn't blushing. "I never knew you could be such a sap," I said with a laugh.

She kicked me under the covers. We fell asleep like that, laughing and wrapped up in each other.

And then we drove to the airport the next day.

It was dreamlike, going through security and sitting down to get that one last cup of Seattle coffee in the airport. We boarded the plane and found our seats. I was taking one last, long look at the gray Seattle sky when I heard the intercom.

"Please put your seats in upright position as we prepare for takeoff."

Sam looked at me. She squeezed my hand. We didn't say anything, and I could tell that this was her nervous moment. Because in the last month or so that we'd uprooted our lives preparing for this move, it'd never seemed _real. _It seemed like a dream, something we could see only in our imagination that would never play out in real life.

And, now, it was happening.

We took off. We didn't say another word until we were well off Pacific soil, flying over the Midwest. It was mostly small talk—jobs, our bills, races Sam was planning on entering (yeah, I'd talked her into it.)

And then New York came into view.

Sam had the window seat, so I had to crane my neck to get a good look at it. The buildings in Seattle had nothing on these mountainous skyscrapers, which dominated the lower portion of Manhattan. It was huge. It was busy and big and populated and _sunny_, and for early November weather like this could only be dreamed of in Washington.

"When we land," Sam said, "We completely start over."

I nodded. "No Carly, no Tyler, nothing." I looked her in the eye. "Let's leave our skeletons back in Seattle."

"That's a promise."

We stepped off the plane. We found our bags.

And, for the first time, we stepped into New York air.

XXX

**A/N: **To quote Mushu from Mulan: I liiiiiiiiiiiiive!

I'm so, so seriously sorry for how long this update took. Those of you that read me regularly know that I live in the greater New York area, and though I meant to have this chapter up and running much earlier, Hurricane Sandy is responsible for the delay. (I was extremely lucky that the extent of the storm damage for me wasn't much of anything, but there are plenty of people in my area who still don't have electricity and have lost everything.) Anyway, my apologies, hopefully that explains why this chapter took so long. My heart goes out to everyone affected by the hurricane, you're all in my thoughts and prayers.

Moving on, I have a pretty big announcement: _Reach _is my NaNoWriMo story! (I'm not exactly sure if you're allowed to continue a story you've already started for NaNo, but I'm doing it anyway :D) I've so far written 10K words this month for _Reach, _and I'm so excited to get through the meat of this story. I hope you guys enjoy reading it as much as I've enjoyed writing it, because it's been a blast xx

One last thing: yes, it was imperative that I moved the setting to New York City, because let's be real—I didn't know jack about Seattle ;D

Blessings,

xx Vikki


	16. New York

**A/N: **This is most definitely the shortest and least soap-y chapter I've written of this fic so far. Really, this is more like "Part 1" of chapter sixteen; Part 2 is close to six thousand words so I didn't want to burden you guys with reading them all in one sitting. I'll have chapter seventeen up by Friday :D

xx Vikki

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Sixteen

_New York_

The life. That was the first thing that hit me.

From the minute Sam and I hailed our first taxi to everything else that happened that afternoon, I couldn't believe just how many _people_ lived in New York. The population of Seattle isn't even a million people. Overnight, I was thrown into a world where over nine million human beings were crammed into five boroughs.

Sam turned to me in the taxi. She said it best.

"I love it already."

Moving in would be a hassle, so we made an agreement. Our first night in New York would be spent in a hotel; we would use it to be New Yorkers and see the city. The moving logistics could be addressed in the days, weeks, _whatever _that followed. We'd have plenty to worry about after that first night; jobs, paperwork, furniture, to name a few. We might as well spend a night on the town before cracking down and getting into the serious things.

We checked into the Marriot on 65th Street, getting our first taste of the Upper West side. Sam ran up the stairs, throwing her things onto the bed and getting changed out of her airplane clothes before I'd even had a chance to use the bathroom.

"Hurry up, slowpoke!" She already had a foot out the door. "It's four PM on a Tuesday, we have a whole city to see."

"Can't I take care of some bodily functions—"

"God no. You should've peed when we were living on the Pacific Coast."

With that, she was out the door. I ran after her, down and out of the hotel.

To say that first afternoon was what sold me would be a gross understatement. I was sold after doing a digital room-tour of our apartment online.

Our first day in New York—November 2nd—was the day I knew we weren't just starting over. We were starting over in the best city in the world.

It wasn't perfect, and it wasn't always pretty. I could see that right off the bat. We grabbed drinks at happy hour in a fancy bar uptown. For every ribbon slim model and starving artist, there was someone less-than-chaste-looking (to put it nicely) lurking in the corner. But the attitude of New Yorkers was clear; don't fuck with us. We'll mind our own business, and we'll do a damn good job of it.

Chelsea, Gramercy, Flatiron and Tribeca were just names before. I heard those words thrown around so many times that first afternoon. Wherever we went and whoever we met, Sam made a point to say we were new to the area, that we'd just moved from Seattle.

"For real?" one guy had asked.

"Yeah." She laughed. "We have _no _idea what we're doing."

He gave us the lowdown. The best food was in Chelsea, the Guggenheim and the MoMa were "killer", if we wanted to meet America's one percent all we'd have to do was pay a visit to Wall Street, etc.

We went everywhere. Uptown, downtown, midtown—the only place we didn't hit that first night was New Jersey.

"Fuck, you know what I just realized?" I told Sam, hanging onto the rail of our subway car.

"What?"

"We're going to see maybe five percent of what we want to see by the end of tonight."

"Damn. You're right."

We looked at each other. I could tell the idea was running through her head too.

"We should extend this whole 'tour the city' experience—"

"—yeah, we need way more than just one night—"

"—I completely agree."

"Best idea we've had in a long time," she finished.

Central park was huge. Fifth Avenue was expensive as hell. The line to tour the Empire State building was fucking _long, _so we saved that for another day. The Highline—one of the city's best kept secrets, at least to outsiders—was beautiful at night. And no matter where we went, the energy was unbelievable.

We ate at Buddakan that night, which was a trendy Asian place in Chelsea.

"Every bite is heaven," Sam decided.

I nodded, too busy stuffing my face with noodles to respond.

The check came at the end of the meal. We justified the most expensive dinner of our lives by deciding it was also the most delicious.

And then we were stepping out into the brisk November air. It was well after eleven, and it was clear that the night was still young. People lined the streets, and cars were whizzing by. (Well, as fast as they could, considering the traffic.)

"So," she asked, "When d'you think the novelty of it all will wear off?"

I laughed. "That's a good one, Puckett."

"Oh right. Fucking _never." _She cheered into the night. "And we'll never have to leave!" She was shouting to no one in particular, but the person who those words would have the most effect on was standing right next to her.

_Never._

"Never" was a very long time. And Sam never used words that indicated anything longer than the present, because from what I'd gathered, Sam believed everything was temporary. And "never" was definitely _not _temporary.

My heart beat out of my chest, but I took my chance to say it. I took her hand. "We're really starting over, aren't we?"

"Yeah." She turned around to face me. "Man, we're making a new life for ourselves." She paused. "That's _deep."_

I laughed. "You just love killing _every _serious moment with sarcasm."

"Fine, I'll humor you," she said. "We're making a new life for ourselves. And I'm excited."

"Sure. Thanks."

She scoffed, exasperated. "Seriously, Benson?"

"Okay, so maybe I'm excited to be starting over," I said slowly, "but what I'm really excited about is that I'm starting it with you."

She smiled. _Don't ruin it, Sam, we're having a moment._

"You sap. Quit being such a mush, we have sights to see."

I rolled my eyes, and I let her take my hand and guide me down the street. Yeah, so she ruined it. But that was Sam for you.

If she was anyone else, I wouldn't love her.

XXX

**A/N: **Thank you so much to everyone that's R&Red, your love and support means the world to me. Let me know what you guys think of this chap, I'll have another one up soon. Tease for next time—we'll meet some OC's ;D

xx Vikki


	17. The Marathon

_Reach for Something that's Already Gone_

Chapter Seventeen

_The Marathon_

Getting a place in Greenwich Village was lucky, and that's an understatement. We were obviously the newbies on the block; we'd been calling it "Green-witch" Village until someone had politely told us it was pronounced "Gren-uch." That and whenever someone brought up "the Village" our first week there, we didn't have a clue what they were talking about. _West-Coasters, _they probably figured.

Weeks one and two were blurs of unpacking, Ikea trips and job hunting. Sam found a job working at a bar in the Theater district (typical), and I started my first day in Best Buy the first week of November. Both paid just above minimum wage and were completely blue-collar, but it was the best we could do without a college education and having nothing but "web-stars" on our resume.

If anything sealed the deal on our move, though, it was that first weekend. The buzz of the New York City marathon was everywhere, and since I was living with an exercise junkie, I jumped on the opportunity.

"You know, the Marathon is this Sunday," I told her.

"Yeah, I've heard." She was in the middle of brushing her teeth, scrambling around to not be late for work. "What mile will you be standing at?"

"What?"

"Y'know, where are gonna cheer me on?"

"You're kidding, right?" I said laughing dryly. "I run easily forty miles a week thanks to you, I'm running this thing with you."

"Hahh! Nice one. We'll see what shape you're in by mile ten."

With that and a peck on the lips, she was out the door.

She was right, obviously. As much as I ran, I was_ slow. _Sam wasn't. And after our morning runs, she usually went out and did something in the evenings too, so Sam's training was way more intensive than mine.

Still, when that Sunday morning rolled around, I insisted on doing those first six with her. "I'm not going to bog you down, I promise," I assured her, "don't let yourself slow down because of me, but I'm really going to try to stay with you."

"You pansy! You really think I'm going to let you sabotage my race?" she joked.

I rolled my eyes. "No. Sorry if I want to share at least some of the marathon experience with you."

We were going to have to run the race bandit-style, since we missed the lottery and weren't officially entered. We got to the line early; it was a chilly day, it couldn't have been any warmer than fifty degrees.

I heard a voice behind me. "Hey!"

I turned around, and smiled when I saw a familiar face waving at me.

"Sandra, what's up?"

She walked over, with an arsenal of friends in tow. I was relieved she made a point not to hug me, probably because Sam was there.

"It's good to see you! Are you guys running?"

"He's not, but I am," Sam replied.

"You're Sam, right?"

She nodded.

Sandra stuck out her hand. "It's nice to meet you, I'm Sandra."

_C'mon, Sam, make nice, _I screamed in my head. I breathed a sigh of relief when she shook it, her expression void of anything except pre-race nerves. She didn't seem peeved at Sandra in the slightest. Good.

"So you're the one that helped us find an apartment?" she asked.

Sandra laughed. "Well—"

"—that would actually be me." A dark haired male figure raised his hand, and his low, gravelly voice was a dead giveaway.

"James, right?"

"It's nice to meet the iCarly stars in the flesh," he responded. We made the rounds and shook hands, introducing ourselves. Everyone knew who Sam and I were—most of Sandra's friends were our age or fresh out of college, and all of them had grown up watching iCarly or at least knowing what it was. There was Nina, a spit-ball platinum blonde from New Jersey, and the most serious runner in the group. Laura and Darius, two newlyweds; Laura was a retired model, and Darius was decent looking at best, but had enough charm and humor to make up for it. There was Devon, the oldest of everyone and a pure-blood redneck, and his brother Will, a bright-eyed intellect. Julia rounded out the group with her quiet and otherwise normal demeanor.

"Are all of you guys running?" Sam asked.

"I'm not," Sandra replied.

"Yeah, neither are we," Julia said, pointing at herself and the newlyweds.

"Are both of you running today?" Nina asked.

I laughed. "Nahh, this girl here is in it to win, she isn't doing letting my race with her after mile six." Sam rolled her eyes, and Nina turned her attention to her.

"Are you trying to qualify for Boston?"

She shook her head. "I missed the lottery, so I'm not registered."

Nina nodded. I smirked, stepping in and trying to say as casually as possible, "Sam's run an ultra before."

I expected that statement to make everyone go quiet, but the opposite happened.

"What? No way!"

"How was it? I heard those are killer—"

"—you iCarly stars are just full of surprises, aren't ya?"

"Thanks," Sam quickly, and then she shot me a glare, "but it wasn't an official Ultramarathon or anything. I did an eighty-miler out of stress once, that's all."

Yeah, modesty wasn't Sam's strong suit.

_That _got everyone quiet—everyone except Nina. She was beaming, her eyes twinkling as she clapped Sam on the back. "Well, then it's you and me, sister. Keep with me and I'll take you to the finish line in Boston speed."

Putting Sam in the same room as a strong personality was always interesting; she'd either hate the person or become their best friend. So it relieved me when Sam returned that smile to Nina. _Good, _I thought. _This is going well._

Those of us that were running made our way to the line, while Sandra, the newlyweds, and Julia trekked on to mile six. "We'll pick you up from there, Freddie," Sandra yelled over her shoulder. We said our good lucks to one another as we lined up.

And then the gun went off.

Nina took off right out of the gate, and instead of falling into stride with her, Sam made a point to stay a good fifteen meters back. I looked over to her, questioningly.

Sam waved her hand dismissively. "The race doesn't begin until mile eighteen. I'll pick her off later."

I nodded. It was strategic, and smart all the same, but Sam struck me as the kind of racer that would let her pride decide her race. For her to have a "who-do-you-think-you-are-telling-me-how-to-race" attitude would've made sense; I could see her chasing down Nina right out of the gate and trying to get a healthy lead. But instead she was holding back, biding time and waiting.

_Nice to see you acting like a grown-up, _I thought only half-jokingly.

I stayed with her, and it took me all of, gee, fifteen minutes to be grateful I didn't have to run this entire thing with her. Nina was setting a blistering speed, and even from fifteen meters back, keeping it was fucking challenging. At least for me.

"How you feeling?" I asked her at mile four.

She laughed. "What, tired already?"

_"No." _I sounded like a ten-year-old.

"Really? Because we're hitting seven-fifteen miles—"

_SHIT. _I balked at that, and it must've been visible, because Sam was trying to stifle laughter for the next two miles.

_Seven-fifteens. You've got to be kidding me._

Relief washed over me when I heard the hoots and hollers of Sandra and company from a distance. We rounded the corner and, sure enough, the six mile mark was there.

"Okay," I said, "I'm gonna—"

She grabbed my shirt, planting a sloppy kiss on my cheek mid-run. "Bye, slowpoke."

I stumbled off the course, and thankfully Darius was right there anticipating my clumsiness. "Easy, easy," he said, letting me hold on to him for support.

My breathing was heavy. _"How," _I managed, "the _hell _do they expect to keep—" I gulped in some air, "that _pace?"_

Sandra and Laura were beside themselves in hysterics. Julia fished a sealed water bottle out of her bag, handing it to me wordlessly. I chugged it down.

"Is Sam trying to keep with Nina?" Darius asked me.

I shrugged. "Yeah. She's hanging back for now, she wants to pick her off later in the race."

Laura let out loud laugh. "Hahh! Not happening. I've known Nina for forever, the girl's a fucking machine."

I heard hints of Southern twang in Laura's voice, which was an indication of how long she'd lived in the Northeast.

I heard Sandra scream. "Let's go James! C'mon Will, pick up the pace!"

Will flashed us a grin as he ran by, while James didn't do much more than nod, clearly in a zone he didn't want to be disrupted from.

"Always so serious," Julia said with a smirk, waving at James. He offered her a small smile and kept running.

Once everyone had passed, the five of us took the subway and headed over to the halfway mark. Darius and Sandra were rattling off everyone's projected times, and in the meantime, I learned a little something about each of them from Laura's commentary.

"Okay, so Devon's aiming to break three today—"

"What?!" Laura exclaimed, laughing. "No way."

Darius nodded. "Hey, if he's at the half by ninety minutes, then he has a shot."

"I know Nina's going for three fifteen," Julia added.

"Okay, so Nina and Sam will probably be there a little after Devon—"

"—which leaves Will and James last," Laura finished.

I nodded, listening along. I couldn't keep all of these names straight. Laura giggled, holding on to Darius and nestling her head in his shoulder. "Poor James. I can't believe I talked him into this and bailed."

"You're so _mean," _he said, kissing her on the head.

I watched the exchange, confused. Laura noticed my expression and burst out laughing.

"James is my oldest friend, we decided to train for the marathon together last year—"

"You didn't decide, you locked the guy in a closet and wouldn't let him out until he agreed!"

"Pfft!" Laura said, waving her hand dismissively. "I wanted to train for this fucking thing, you better believe I wasn't going to do it alone!"

"Why weren't you her training buddy, Darius?" I teased.

The whole group laughed at that.

"Because I'm _lazy," _he said. "I love her, but not that much."

"Oh, shut up." Laura punched his arm. "Anyway, so we were a couple months into our training. Then I got married, and y'know, things happen, so—"

"She got knocked up!" Sandra exclaimed, unable to contain herself.

Laura was beside herself in hysterics. "A month or two before the marathon, and I have to tell the poor guy, 'oops, sorry! Prepping for motherhood!'"

For some reason, hearing that come out of the mouth of someone like Laura, and knowing what little I did of James—just how smooth but somewhat broody he was—was enough to send _me _into hysterics, when I barely knew them. We laughed our way through a couple of subway stops, and Laura and Sandra kept on at it, telling stories and filling me in on the latest gossip.

From what I'd gathered, Darius was the oldest in soul and the recovering alcoholic/druggie/you name it. I understood why him and Laura were together—he probably had plenty of bad-boy appeal back in the day. Laura kept referencing his trips to AA, and even though some of her jokes (okay, basically _all _of them) crossed the line, Darius seemed to be mildly amused by all of it.

We made our way to the half. Sandra and Laura got us all a round of beers from the concession stand.

"You people suck. I didn't go to rehab for this," Darius said, with mock annoyance as he swigged from his water bottle. Julia and I nursed our beers while Sandra grabbed a few more. She was tipsy _lonnnnng_ before Devon (or anyone else) was in sight.

"Damnit, why d'you have to be knocked up?" Sandra said with a scowl, putting her arm around Laura. "I miss my old drinking buddy!" The two of them went off the talk up other spectators, and Darius followed.

After an hour of non-stop conversation that I was having a hard time keeping up with, I finally breathed a sigh of relief.

"You must think we're all crazy," Julia casually remarked.

"Eh. Relatively." I shrugged, making a point to smile. "I'm used to crazy, though."

"Mhm. Sandra told me you and Sam are living together."

My heart skipped a beat. I didn't remember telling Sandra that. I breathed a sigh of relief as I thought, _right. James sold the apartment to a 'Fredward Benson _AND _Samantha Puckett.' Of course she knows._

Julia said it in such a way that she didn't press or ask what was going on between the two of us. She added, "I used to watch iCarly. I know how she can be."

I laughed. "Yeah. Well, things are different now." I pointed to Laura and Sandra, who were going around and talking to other spectators. I could hear their cackles from down the block. "It's been a while since we've had any friends. We could use them."

I was surprised as the words came out of my mouth. I barely knew Julia. But of everyone in the group, I felt comfortable around her. She seemed easygoing. I knew my judgment of her was right when she grabbed another round of beers for me and her; she handed me one and lifted hers up, toasting, "Well, then, to friends."

"New and old," I agreed. Just as we drank to that, an earsplitting shriek courtesy of Sandra and Laura came from our right.

_"DEVON!"_

Sure enough, the golden-haired red-neck was rounding the corner, hooting and hollering as he passed. Not quite done with the theatrics, he ripped his shirt off, sending it in Laura's direction, winking at Sandra, and blowing Julia a kiss.

"Devon, stop being a whore," Darius barked after him.

Julia turned to me. "He's such a flirt. He'll sweet-talk to anything that moves."

"Mhm." Sure enough, Nina and Sam were rounding that same corner shortly thereafter, right at their target time. Sam was still a good ten meters behind, but she looked strong.

Once they'd left I asked Julia, "Why is Devon out in front?"

"Hmm?"

"Well, Nina's super hardcore, shouldn't she be leading?"

Darius interjected. "Freddie, Devon is a _guy. _And he's also hardcore—Nina's just more obvious about it." He thought before adding. "That and Devon does other sports too."

"Yeah, ask Nina what she thinks of triathlons sometime. She'll turn ghost-white."

Darius laughed. "Oh yeah. It's so funny."

The five of us spent the rest of the race hopping on subway cars to different points of the course—mile twenty was next, and after that, we made our way to the finish line. I spent close to two hours with Darius, Laura, Sandra and Julia that day. At the end of those two hours, people that were complete strangers to me before became people whose inside jokes I was in on. Their personal lives were laid out in the open, and not once did they pry into mine. Maybe it was standard New Yorker demeanor—to be accepting and welcoming of everyone—or the fact that I had the ins with the obvious ringleader of the group, _whatever, _what I knew for a fact was that these were people Sam and I could get along with just fine. More than fine, actually.

Devon crossed the line in just over three hours. He stumbled through the gate, and within ten meters he had a medal in one hand—thanks to the officials—and a beer in the other—thanks to Darius.

"Whoo!" he hollered. Julia wordlessly handed him his shirt. He chugged his beer and threw in out, redressing and hanging his medal around his neck. "_That's _how you run a marathon!"

We were all grins as we waited for everyone else to finish. No one cheered louder than me when I saw Sam and Nina come barreling down the homestretch, stride for stride with one another.

_"C'mon Sam! Pass her! If you can do eighty miles on an empty stomach then you can pass her, let's go!"_

She gained a second wind, and with a burst of speed was right on Nina's heel. It was all of one step's difference, and we all held our breath as watched, but Nina finished ahead.

"3:12 and fifty-seven seconds—for both of us!" Nina announced. Her and Sam had their arms around each other, half as a friendly gesture and half out of support. They were stumbling around, but smiling nonetheless. "That's a new PR!"

"Yeah, for you at least," Sam mocked.

Nina turned to her, and she addressed Sam directly. "You," she said, jabbing her finger into Sam's chest, "are _amazing. _Seriously, I've never seen anything like that."

"Nina's just trying to say she's not used to being challenged," Devon said with a booming laugh.

"Oh, shove _off."_She rolled her eyes and turned back to Sam. "James sold you that apartment in the West Village, right?" Sam nodded. "Okay, cool. Give me your number and address, we'll start running together."

I looked at Sam searchingly. Nina probably didn't know it, but she was walking on eggshells. Sam was picky with who she surrounded herself with.

But Sam gave me a look that plain as day said, _Nahh, I'm okay with this. She's cool. _"No problem. Freddie, you have my cell, right?"

"Yeah, sure—" I fished it out of my pocket.

And then erupted conversation amongst the eight of us, where everyone exchanged numbers. Nina and Sam worked out a running schedule, while at the same time, Sandra starting blabbing on about all of the parties she had planned for the rest of the fall and how she'd be "so stoked if you and Sam could make it." In the meantime, Laura and Darius practically cornered me and made me swear on something important that we'd go double-dating with them sometime, because, yes, "It's obvious you two are a couple, so _stop _trying to be so shy about it!"

The buzz of conversation and social planning was interrupted when we caught sight of Will. Nobody cheered louder than his older brother.

"Willy! Willyyyyyyy!" Devon kept hollering.

Will sheepishly smiled, waving and sauntering over after crossing the line in just under four hours.

"Well," he said, "that was invigorating."

"You little prick, you weren't pushing it at all!" Devon said to him.

"Devon, _how _in the hell d'you expect me to compete with you?" He pointed at Devon, "Or them?" he added, pointing at Nina and Sam.

Bickering ensued until James finally made his way down the stretch, the last of everyone to finish. He was panting along, not acknowledging us and keeping his focus straight ahead. Julia, in an act of instinct, wordlessly threw down her bag and ran onto the course, running the last 200 meters with him. They matched each other stride for stride as Julia talked in his ear; we couldn't hear what she was saying to him, but they could only be words of encouragement. All the while, Nina, Sandra, Laura and Devon started chanting.

"James, James, James, James…"

The rest of us joined in, and by the time he crossed the line we were all shouting, clapping and cheering as he joined our group. Laura and Sandra ran over to the concession stand and grabbed us all beers. All the while, we congratulated one another, talking under the November sun.

_"That _was a spectacular finish—"

"For someone that's never run seriously before, that was really something."

"Damn, I wish I wasn't pregnant! I missed out on the race of your life!"

"Breaking four and a half hours, not so shabby for a rookie, Weiss . . ."

After a few minutes of our coddling, James managed to say something.

He pointed directly at the girl with the wavy brown hair.

"Laura." We waited. "_Fuck. You."_

There was something about the expression on his face and the was James deadpanned it, and how we didn't know if he was teasing or dead serious, that made it the most hysterical thing in the world. We burst out in booming laughter. Those of us that'd been drinking since the AM were loud, and the marathoners in their endorphins-spiked conditions were even louder.

At one point, Sam and I caught each others' gaze. She was smiling. She was _beaming. _I was sure I looked the same.

Sam and I didn't just know each other well at this point—if you asked me what was running through her head, all I had to do was get a look at her expression and I could tell you. And I knew exactly what she was thinking right now.

_This is nice. I've missed this._

For as long as I could remember, iCarly was my family. All of my close friends were part of the show, and all through middle school, high school, and the years I was supposed to spend in college, _that _was my social life. Spencer had been dead for five and a half years; I hadn't spoken to Gibby for that long, either. And Carly . . .

I shook my head. I looked at where I was.I'd forgotten her.

Anyway, it'd been a while since I'd felt like I was part of something. I knew Sam felt the same. It was our first week in New York, and we were already running and drinking with people that'd welcomed us with open arms.

We'd taken starting over to a whole different level. We were making a home for ourselves.

After a while, we all started to wind down. Devon, Sandra, Nina and (surprisingly) Will were _bombed, _and Sam and I were well on our way. Everyone that'd run started to take note of how badly they needed a proper meal/shower.

"So," Laura said, interrupting one of Devon's drunken tangents. "Showers now, and we'll all meet up at eight?"

"Sure!"

"Sounds good. Laura, we're going to your place, right?"

"Yep," Darius said. He pointed right at me and Sam. "You two are coming."

_That _caught us off guard. Sam was talking before anything could come out of my mouth, "Ugh, seriously, man, I just need to sleep for two years—"

"Oh no you don't, you guys are coming over," Laura demanded. "I cooked all of last week." She gasped, obviously realizing something incredibly important. "Shit! You guys haven't met Kenzie and Darcy yet!"

Sam stared blankly, while I felt an onslaught of dread. _Oh god. More people. _I looked at the handful of people I'd just met, and mentally added, _make that more people with strong personalities._

Laura's statement started a chain reaction, and before long, everyone was name dropping at least two or three other people that would be at Laura's and Darius' that night. "Dude, you have to meet Mike—he's such a techie, you guys will buddy up like _that." _"The Burkes are in town, I'm pretty sure they lived in Seattle a few years ago." "Wait, if the Burkes are coming, then how many people did you _invite?"_

"Listen," Sam said, interrupting everyone. "Fucking hell, we'd love to go. But Freddie can vouch for me—we still have a shit-load of unpacking to do."

Okay. So she wasn't lying. "Yeah, she's right."

Laura pressed. "But—"

"Nahh, man, it's cool," Darius interjected. We made eye contact and he gave me a slight nod. "Go do your unpacking, it's been a long day. But you're not bailing on the next one."

"Yeah. I'm throwing something Thanksgiving weekend," Nina piped up.

"Awesome," Sam said. "We'll totally be game for that."

Relief washed over me as we went around, shaking hands and saying our goodbyes. Nobody said "it was nice meeting you" or anything along those lines—it was all "text me this weekend" or "if you never need anything, give me a call." We were finally out of Central Park by five that afternoon, and dusk was encroaching on the concrete jungle.

Sam and I didn't say anything until we hit the subway—not because we didn't have anything to say, but because we had _everything _to say and I could tell we both needed some time to just catch our breath and wind down.

It wasn't until we had two stops to go when I finally said, "I wonder if everyone here is that friendly."

"Tell me about it!"

"Really? You agree with me?"

She snorted. "No _shit _I agree with you. We talk to these people for one afternoon and they already have us socially booked till Christmas."

"Okay. It just seemed like some of them would piss you off—"

"Why would say that?" she demanded.

"Well, they're all so . . ." I looked for the right word.

"Headstrong?"

"Yeah. That."

Sam shrugged. "I guess." She thought for a second. "You're right, that usually does piss me off."

"Well, did it today?"

She shook her head. "Nu-uh. I mean, yeah, Devon has an ego problem—but none of them seem catty."

I let that sink in for a second. I racked my brain, thinking of all the conversations I'd had today. I picked up on some sarcastic jabs here and there, but now that Sam mentioned it, there was _zero _hostility between anyone there. All seven of them (from attention whores like Laura and Devon to calm, cool and collected James Weiss) seemed to genuinely enjoy each others' company.

"Yeah," I agreed. "They're all really good friends. You can tell."

"Mhm. Really good friends looking for a good time."

That was all we said for the rest of the subway ride. Fatigue hit us both like a train, and we walked up to our apartment, exhausted in one of the best ways humanly possible. Sam wanted to go right to bed, but I protested.

"_You _ran for three hours today," I reminded her. "You seriously need to replace some lost carbs, man."

"Okay, fine. But I'm way too wiped to go to a restaurant."

I'd entertained the idea before, but I thought that the night of the marathon was the perfect time to put it to use. We still had a candle-lit, romantic dinner; it was in the comforts of our apartment, courtesy of Samurai Sushi takeout.

I told Sam to at least shower before dinner. While she did, I moved the table to the edge of our apartment, right by the window so it overlooked the city skyline. I set a table for two, lit some candles, and reveled in the look on Sam's face when she walked out of our bedroom.

"Fuck. You're kidding me!" she exclaimed.

"You like it?"

"Like it?! I look like a goddamn slob!" With that, she went back into our room, slamming the door behind her. "I don't care _how _long we've been living together for, I _refuse _to be that asshole that wears sweats on a nice date!"

I said it before I could lose the courage to. "_Together for, _Sam," I corrected. "That's what it is, we might as well say it. It's less of a mouthful than 'living together for,' anyway."

She stepped out in no time, wearing a white sundress.

"Okay, fine," she said. She pecked me on the lips, and looked me in the eye. _"Together for."_ The way it rolled off her tongue sent a shiver down my spine.

We ate in candlelit glow, talking between bites with relative ease. It was comfortable. _This _was comfortable. We joked around about the marathon, and Sam filled me in on what it was like to race Nina.

"Did I look like I was dying?"

"No."

"Good. I felt like a fish out of water."

I raised a brow. "Is she really that good?"

Sam nodded. "Dude, we clocked under seven for the last six miles. You don't want a girl like her as your rival."

I smirked. "Looks like you have a racing buddy, Sam."

She laughed. "Yeah, well, she's under the impression that I'm some running Jesus that does ultras in her spare time. No thanks to you."

The banter went on. Every once in a while we'd fall into comfortable silence. Most of the time, if I followed her line of sight, I could see her looking out into the city.

The same thing was running through both of our heads.

"It's beautiful, isn't it?" I breathed.

She snapped her attention back to me. The look on her face was clear as day. It was the _oh my god. You just read my mind._

And something about it all clicked. We were dining in candlelight, at the end of the perfect day. We were in the best city in the world. It was something about the way the light bounced off her skin, and how I could see every freckle on her nose, and how her still damp hair was starting to curl.  
>And those eyes. It was something about those blue-green, fair eyes.<p>

"I can't tell what's more beautiful . . ." I started.

Her breath hitched. I didn't even have to finish my sentence.

Before I knew it, she was leaning across the table, kissing me with the utmost sincerity. For most couples that would mean 'tender,' but not for us.

The table was flipped over in a matter of seconds.

We weren't a tender couple.

We wrapped ourselves up in each other, on the floor and kissing like the world was crumbling around us. It was frantic in the sense that we couldn't get enough of each other—we didn't want to wait. Skip dessert, why not?, if it meant getting to be together sooner.

My hand was up her dress. She was working my shirt off my body. In the heat of that moment, I realized, _we haven't had sex since moving to New York. _It was sad, but true. Jet lag and unpacking had exhausted us.

That was the first of many nights we would share together in that great city. We didn't bother undressing all the way, and as I entered her, a thought kept drumming in my head. This wasn't the kind of sex we had in Seattle. Seattle had an edge to it—we fucked like bandits, because we both figured the same thing. Emotional sex with each other was wrong. It was wrong because we were living under the same roof out of circumstance rather than choice, and because Carly was still in the picture. We were enemies; we'd know that our entire lives, because we were naturally born, Junior high enemies.

But here, there was nothing wrong about it. We were free.

She wasn't the Samantha Puckett I'd grown up with; she had all of the sarcasm and the free spirit of that girl, but she was different. I saw this. I was the one that watched her transform, without even realizing what was going on.

'Fucking' was deleted from my vocabulary that night. It was 'making love' now. I'd hated that phrase before. I'd thought it was stupid—corny.

But in this great city and under its lights, and with this girl, I understood.

It was hours before we'd finished. She turned to me at the end, and instead of pushing me off her like she usually did, she pulled me back down. I was still on top. Our noses were touching, and our lips inches apart.

Our gaze never separated.

She said it softly. So softly, I almost missed it.

"I love you, Freddie Benson."

_I knew it. I knew it I knew it I knew it._

I smiled. "I know."

She rolled her eyes, but laughed and kissed me. The kissing lasted a while; it was well into the night when we started, and the sun was peeking out over the horizon when we stopped. At one point, we fell asleep, on the hardwood floor in our new apartment.

I dreamt of bright lights. I dreamt of towering skyscrapers and streets lined with people. I dreamt of running through those streets, running as fast as my legs could carry me, so fast that I was lifted off the ground and flying.

The entire time, I was holding someone hand. She was the most beautiful girl I'd ever seen.

_Living with you has been so amazing._

_ Really?_

_ Really._

_ I've done nothing but bust your ass._

_ Yeah, I guess. But I've gotten the chance to see you open up to me. It's worth it._

"I love you, Freddie Benson."

That was the first night I'd heard those words. They'd ring in my head for the next twelve years.

XXX

**A/N: **Writing this chapter was like running a marathon :D (lolrunningpuns.)

I tried to organize the OCs as best as I could, but I'm sorry if I was throwing _waaaaay _too many names at once. The desired effect what that you would feel the way Freddie did—exhausted. Hopefully I got across what I intended with all of them. They're _not _perfect people, they're all just as insane as Sam and Freddie are.

As far as the corny dream-sequence at the end goes . . . well, I just had to ;D

Lemme know if you guys want me to link photo inspirations of the OCs, because I do have a set idea of what they all look like in mind.

Hope you guys are having a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend! I'll be back with a new chapter verrrrrry soon :D

xx Vikki


	18. Of Course I Fell in Love with Sam

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Eighteen

_Of Course I Fell in Love with Sam_

The highlight reel of my life is divided up by a lot of things—the good memories, the bad, the firsts, the lasts, where I was and who I was with, you name it.

I was thirty five years old. I was taking a coffee shop day. These memories were all long gone.

I had to keep telling myself that, because as I was thinking about our first week in New York, I let myself _feel _for a minute. I felt my knuckles turn white from the pressure of clutching my fourth mug of coffee; I felt my blood boil and tears threaten to fall from my eyes.

And then I had to tell myself, _it's over, Freddie. Put this in perspective._

I'm not going to lie—even before this coffee day, I thought about Sam. A lot. It's hard to forget someone you fell desperately in love with, even years after it was over. It's even harder to forget your first love.

Just my luck that Sam falls into both of those categories, right?

I knew I would never forget Sam—that wasn't what I was looking for. I sipped from my mug, thinking of how the last ten years of my life had been composed of fleeting memories of _this _specific time in my life—of New York. Because whenever I wanted to think of Sam, especially in the wake of us falling apart, it would never be about our time in Seattle right after Carly's betrayal. It definitely wasn't about when we were in high school, or the five years we spent filming iCarly after Spencer's death. I'd always associate Sam with those city lights and that irreplaceable energy, because _that _was when we'd really grown together.

_So what the hell am I doing back in Seattle?_

That was the million dollar question for my now thirty-five year old self. Because after everything that'd happened, wouldn't it make more sense for me to put as many miles between me and this city as I could? To stay on the East Coast?

Well, love it or hate it, one thing was true about Seattle; my roots were there. I wasn't born and raised in that New York energy; I grew up with the Seattle rain, being used to the greenery of it all. It was where I'd gotten my start. And, just as importantly, it was where Sam and I began our journey.

I loved thinking about New York, though. I loved thinking about me and _Sam _in New York. And, since today was my day to think about my time with Sam unedited and uncut, I was going to enjoy those precious memories we had in New York. By the end of our story, things would turn very ugly. I might as well milk the good times for all they were worth.

XXX

The routine we fell into after that first week was the kind of routine I loved; I non-routine.

Novembers on the East Coast were a mixed bag; cloudless days and overcast ones were equal occurrences, and when the sun was out we'd often jump at the chance to escape the city. Sam and Nina became fast friends, and the rest was history. Not only did we have a social life with Alessandra and company; we had a social life with the rest of City Running Nation.

City Running Nation was the group Nina and Devon were part of; they were a hardcore, invite only group of distance runners. There were "sprinters" that trained for the 5K and 10Ks, and then there were the _real _adrenaline junkies that were gearing up for the Badwater Ultramarathon (don't ask). Honestly, I couldn't care less about CRN—I was just happy _not _to have to slog through seven miles of panting at Sam's heels every morning.

"I'm about to tell you something that might have serious consequences," I announced one morning.

"Consequences being…?"

"You might dump me."

"Oh, god," Sam said, mildly amused, "_who _are you sleeping with?"

I laughed. "No one, it's just that I've gained fifteen pounds."

Sam spluttered the coffee she was drinking out of her mouth. "Fifteen pounds?!"

"Uh-huh."

"In two weeks?!"

"Gee, I thought you'd be a _little _more understanding, because I'm obviously _so _upset," I remarked, my voice dripping with sarcasm.

"It's not that I'm not understanding, you fat ass," she said, slapping at me to stop. I smirked. She still looked at me, exasperated. "It's that you only stopped running with me two weeks ago!"

"Yep."

"How the fuck d'you gain fifteen pounds in two weeks!?"

I shrugged. "Beats me." I brightened, asking, "So. Are you breaking up with me or not?"

She rolled her eyes. I was ecstatic that we'd officially labeled ourselves as a couple, and she knew that. I couldn't care less about the fact that my jeans were tight. "No," she said. "But I think you should join a gym. Keep this up and you'll be obese by Christmas."

"What, I shouldn't try to join the CRN?" I asked, teasing.

"Very funny." She pecked me on the lips, running off to work and saying a "Bye, love you" over her shoulder.

I don't think I'd ever get used to that.

That was the weekend of Thanksgiving, and since the weather was gorgeous Sam and I decided to escape the city. Upstate New York was beautiful in the late fall. Cold, but still beautiful. Of course we had to be back by Black Friday, because Nina was having a blowout party at her penthouse that Sam and I weren't allowed to miss. (Turns out the girl was loaded because her parents were elite triathletes in the seventies. Figures.)

We ate Thanksgiving dinner in a restaurant overlooking one of upstate's Fingerlakes, and it was probably one of the most romantic nights of my life. We came home to kegs and peer bong.

"Well," Sam shouted, drowned out by the noise, "Now we know what we missed in college."

"Yeah, this sure looks like a Frat party . . ."

"What?"

I shook my head. _Nevermind, _I mouthed.

I took her hand and guided her to a less crowded, quieter corner of the room. We found Nina and Devon, who were already making the rounds with hors d'oeuvres.

Devon bellowed when his eyes landed on us, his entire face lighting up. _"It's the webstars!" _he shouted. He pulled Sam into a bear hug and clapped me on the back, grinning from ear to ear. Nina squealed like a valley girl and gave us both rib-breaking embraces.

"I'm so glad you guys could make it!" she exclaimed. "Here," she said, practically forcing quiche down our throats. "I've only been cooking since Tuesday, there's plenty of food to go around so you both better leave with full stomachs."

She excused herself and made her way over to other guests, while Devon pulled us into a drinking game. Sam, upon realizing it was flip-cup, turned to Devon and laughed in his face.

"Seriously? I haven't played this since I was sixteen."

"Well, then _you,"_ he said, pausing to chug his glass, giving the cup a flick and flipping it over with perfection, "need to have some fun, my friend."

The two of us got roped in without any say, not that we minded—playing rounds of flip-cup with Devon's friends was way more fun than any club night we'd ever spent with Carly and Tyler. For someone who hadn't played since high school, Sam got in the groove really quickly. I was opposite her, so of course, I was failing.

"C'mon Benson! What, doesn't being camera savvy help finger dexterity?"

"I'm trying!" I replied, half laughing and yelping. I was on a team with Joey and Henry, college buddies of Devon's. They were all in the same fraternity (Devon was a frat boy, _big _surprise there), so they were all getting a kick out of busting my ass for being from iCarly.

Devon, Will and Sam beat us _multiple _times. After the beer started getting to our heads, I excused us, pulling Sam along to get some relief.

We found Darius and Laura after that, and the two of them just about flipped when they say us. (Well, Darius flipped about as much as he could for him. The guy's pretty chill.) They were sitting in what they dubbed "the sober corner," which was essentially Darius and four other pregnant women, one of which was his wife.

"You as a mother is going to be an interesting ride," Darius said to Laura offhandedly.

Sam and I took a seat and sipped at our vodka sodas, which Nina had poured for us. Laura rolled her eyes and punched him. "Shut up."

"When are you due?" Sam asked.

Laura stopped. I could see the gears turning in her head. "Five months? Jesus, I don't even know anymore. I feel like I've been pregnant for forever."

"Well, you look great," I said, trying to lend something to the conversation.

Laura flashed me a smile. Yeah, I could see why she was an ex model. Aside from the slightest baby bump she had the build of one, and with her ski-slope nose, wide-set eyes and wavy, long hair, she looked like something out of a Victoria's Secret catalogue.

"Stop hitting on my woman, bro," Darius scolded.

Laura giggled. "Always so territorial."

Sam and I made nice with them for a bit, and it was clear that those two had a lot of history. From what Sam and I could tell, they'd known each other for forever (like, we're talking childhood forever.) Laura was probably a lot like Devon in her former days; like him, she had the looks to get away with being a notorious flirt. Sam and I heard allusion and after allusion to other guys she'd broken the hearts of. At one point, Darius said something along the lines of, "I saw Andrew the other day. He looked lonely." And then, "Nina and Tommy still talk. Good fucking job, Laura." If you took their interactions out of context, it would seem like their relationship was borderline abusive, from the way they were teasing each other.

"You two!" Laura exclaimed at one point, snapping up and pointing at me and Sam. "How does next weekend sound?"

Sam looked at her blankly. "For what?"

"Double dating." Laura gasped, a sudden realization coming to her. "Oh my god, we should try and get a whole group of people to go! You guys haven't met Kenzie and Adam yet . . ."

"C'mon, Laura," Darius intervened, "We're weird enough as it is. Let's _not_ smother them with more people."

She pouted, but reluctantly agreed. Sam looked over to me, I gave her a slight nod, and that interaction alone was enough to make an executive decision; time to leave the Sober Corner.

We excused ourselves, making our way across the room. Sam wound up going back to flip cup with Devon, and there was no way in hell I was up for that again. I found Will, who was fiddling around with his phone in the corner.

"You haven't upgraded?" I asked. I pointed to his phone.

"Yeah, well. A new iPhone doesn't exactly fit into my budget." He shrugged. "Sides, I've already made all the upgrades I needed. It's not a complete dinosaur."

"Can I see it?"

"Yeah, sure."

I flipped through the different apps and folders on his phone, and in those ten seconds I gained a lot of respect for Will Hudson. He wasn't any old iPhone user—clearly, he had beyond basic knowledge of phone software, because there were settings on his phone that only someone who was as into technology as me (if not more) would be able to configure.

"You know I used to be iCarly's cameraman, right?"

"Yeah."

I held up his phone, pointing at it incredulously. "Why didn't you ever tell me you were—"

"A dork?" He smiled sheepishly. "Eh, what can I say? I'm closeted."

"Then we, my friend," I said, handing him his phone and clapping him on the back, "Have a lot of work to do."

An hour long conversation about computer software and ten rounds of beer pong and flip-cup later, Sam stumbled over, most likely drunk off her ass and definitely ready to leave.

"Hey," I said, and when I noticed how sloppy she was I threw my arm around for support. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, yeah . . ." She held her head in her hands, and she was doing a swirling motion with it that I didn't know whether it was a nod or a shake. "No, I lied. Too much beer."

I turned to Will, and before a word came out of my mouth, he had New York Taxi Service pulled up on his phone. "Already calling you a cab," he said.

"Man, that's not necessary—"

"Tonight it is. It's Black Friday, everyone's either spending money or getting drunk right now. If you try to hail one it's not going to happen." He pointed at her. "Unless you want to take the subway…?"

She laughed in a way that deadpanned the entire conversation.

I looked at Will searchingly. I saw nothing but sincere concern in his expression.

_Yeah, I think we'll get along real fine._

"Thank you," I said.

"Don't mention it." He walked us out of the building, and when the taxi pulled up, he waved us goodnight. "I'll tell everyone inside you guys left—take care of her, okay?"

I nodded. Sam started giggling, woozy as she was.

"It's what he's been doing for four months, man. He's not gonna stop now."

I rolled my eyes. Will smiled. "Right."

Even as he turned his back and left, I still felt like those twinkling blue eyes were staring into my soul. Kind of creepy for a guy to say about another guy, but honestly, that to me is Will in a nutshell.

XXX

Sam woke up to Starbucks that next morning, as I'd made a point to get her favorite flavor on my coffee run; Gingerbread Latte, grande with extra whip and cinnamon.

"Seriously," she said, sipping it at the breakfast table, "If this isn't the world's best coffee, I don't know what is."

"Well, you're welcome."

She smiled. From the way her eyebrow was furrowed, I could tell she had a headache, which would also mean a raging hangover.

"You feeling okay?" I asked her.

"Hmm?" She snapped up. "Oh, yeah. I mean my head hurts like a mother but I'll get over it." She set her cup down. "Nothing like running in forty degree weather to knock the hangover out of you."

"You mind if I join you?"

"No . . ." she said slowly. A smile crept on to her face. ". . . but I thought you were 'fucking done with this sport,'" she said, throwing up air quotes.

"Oh, I am. But you're not. So I guess that puts me in a compromising position."

She rolled her eyes. "Dweeb."

"You know you love me."

She sighed. I smiled.

_One point for Freddie._

Sam's birthday is December 2nd, which meant we were going to ring in her 23rd with some Christmas spirit. The choice was unanimous _not _to tell Nina or any of Sandra's friends that Sam's birthday was encroaching; that would mean an onslaught of social events and presents and introductions to new people. Honestly, we couldn't keep anyone's names straight, except for maybe the people we'd been with the day of the marathon.

"But we'll still celebrate Christmas with them," I added.

"Oh, absolutely. Just not my birthday."

I was relieved Sam and I were both on the same page as far as our New York friends went. Clearly, they were all social butterflies, and the feeling of having a group of friends had been sorely missed. But sometimes we needed to just keep it simple and dial it back to the dynamic of "us."

We ate at Becco that night, a hole in the wall in the Theater District. That was the first snow of New York that winter; it was a light dusting at best, but stepping out into the crisp, winter night was surreal. Sam and I skipped dessert for the sake of being able to walk in Central Park before the snow was gray and trampled over.

Whoever says you can't find beauty in an urban setting is dead wrong. Central Park at night looked like something from a Christmas card. "Beautiful" didn't quite cover it; "magical" was something along the lines of what I was thinking.

"First snow in the City, huh?" she said.

"Yeah." I gulped back the dry patch in my throat. We walked in silence for a bit. When I reached out to hold her hand in mine, she didn't object.

The quiet of the city was breathtaking. Maybe that was an indication of time (because, for a city that never slept, it only ever got quiet in the latest hours of night), or the fact that we walking deeper into the heart of Central Park. Either way, I didn't object. We could've stayed out there all night, because the picture painted in front of me was beautiful. The girl whosw hand I was holding was beautiful.

Things weren't perfect. But 'perfect' is overrated.

Our walking came to a slow at one point. I turned to Sam, and snowflakes matted down her blonde curls.

"Happy birthday," I said to her.

She didn't say 'thank you' or anything like. She rolled her eyes and went, "Yeah, yeah. Now please tell me you bought jewelry or some shit like that."

"You're one hell of a romantic, aren't you?" is what I said to her as I pulled the box from my jacket pocket.

I handed it to her. I knew what she expected—a necklace, earrings, maybe a bracelet. But the second she'd opened it, I knew I'd struck gold, because her face lit up and I could tell from the way she was biting her lip that she was trying to contain herself.

"I remember you saying something about liking Coldplay . . .?"

"Damnit, Freddie, you son of a bitch!"

She threw her arms around me and kissed, pecking me on the lips repeatedly in flustered excitement.

"Okay," I said, in between kisses. "I know that statement is true, but a 'thank you' would be just fine."

She lifted a brow. The second the devilish smile crossed her face, I knew what was in store.

"I can think of something better than 'thank you.'"

She had me pinned to a tree so fast, there would probably be a bruise on the back of my head the next morning. She starting kissing me, and the way she did it made me wonder if she was holding back every other time we'd slept together, because she was sure as hell going for it now. I felt myself completely drawing myself into her, putting my hands on her and not being able to get enough of Sam.

All of this was happening under the dim lighting of a streetlamp. We were in Central Park.

_Fuck. We're in Central Park._

"Sam—" I interjected.

"Nobody's here except us," she whispered roughly.

That was enough to make the bulge in my pants go from bad to worse. _Oh, god Freddie, please be smart about this. _I could hear the logic begging me to resist—to wait until we got home. The birthday sex could wait.

And then she put my hands down her pants.

_Nope. Logic, you lose._

My fingers were freezing cold, and as I slipped them inside her and felt the rush of warmth, another rush came over me. _This _we'd never done before. We'd had sex plenty of times, more than I could count, and it felt taboo enough on its own. But whatever happened in the bedroom had stayed in the bedroom. I couldn't tell if I was terrified or exhilarated.

She starting slipping her pants down.

"Aren't you—"

"Stupid, I can deal with some cold." More kissing. She grabbed me by the collar and dragged me to one of the park benches. She kept her jacket on but slipped down her sweater and bra, so her breasts were exposed to me in the December air. Her jeans pooled around her ankles. She laid me flat on my back and jumped on top of me, fiercely kissing me on the lips before making her way down to my neck, collarbone, chest . . .

And all the while, my heart was racing. _What if we get caught. What if we get caught. _It wasn't a question, but a statement made out of both fear and adrenaline, because all anyone had to do was go on a midnight stroll through the park and they'd see Sam and me fucking on a bench.

The underlying fear remained. But the half-naked girl on top of me won out.

She'd made her way down to my dick by then, and was kissing it gently before she took it in her mouth. I held her by her hair. It kept snowing on us.

And then, after a few minutes, I realized how backwards this was.

I told her stop. She did, and looked up at me, rolling her eyes and probably expecting me to say something along the lines of, "we're in public, it's too cold, let's get home first."

"It's your birthday," I said, sitting up. She sat up with me.

"Yeah, so?"

I leaned in and whispered it in her ear. "I should be the one going down on you."

Her face lit up just as I'd cut off whatever she was about to say with a kiss, making it as intense as I could before I worked my way down to her clit. As I ate her out and made her legs wobble, there was an undercurrent of, "Oh, my god. Fuck, Freddie . . ."

She kept repeating that, over and over. All the while I was thinking, _she's so warm._

Just when I thought she was there, I stopped, lying down on the bench and pulling her on top of me as I did. She was already one step ahead of me, positioning herself so that she second my back hit the cold, wet metal, I was already inside of her, watching her ride me.

And that's when the memory gets vivid. That's when I realized the natural, platinum streaks in her hair, the green flecks in her blue eyes, the sound of our breathing as we made love to each other in the snowy weather . . .

Those three words came to me very clearly after that.

"I love you, Sam." My whisper was uneven and soft, but there all the same. "I'm completely in love with you."

Her response was something I'll never forget.

"I love you too."

Samantha Puckett was a lot things. 'Guarded' was definitely one of them, until all hell broke loose with Carly's betrayal. 'Fearless' was another. Witty, snarky, explosive at times, and, to me, beautiful.

But she wasn't sappy, and she wasn't emotional. Everything was temporary with Sam. She didn't buy into that romantic bullshit, and the idea of soulmates. Quite frankly, I didn't either. I used to believe it was something worth looking for, but once I'd turned eighteen and I learned the truth about my dad, and how my birth was the reason for my parents' messy divorce, that was it. Carly, Tara, and my parents had set the precedent for a love-life that consisted of meaningless hookups and sweet nothings at best. I didn't see the value of finding "the one"—and if I did, then I saw that value as being something that wasn't going to happen to me.

I'm not saying that was the night I realized Sam was The One. Even twelve years later, I still haven't figured out whether or not she is. But for the duration of our relationship up until that point, we'd been on the same page.

We didn't know what we were doing. We felt something for each other, but we would figure things out as we went along. Let's not put a label on it. Let's _sometimes _express our feelings for each other, but whenever it gets too serious let's kill the moment and dial it back, because let's face it, wrapping our heads around this is too much to handle.

After I said those words, there wasn't a sarcastic, witty statement that'd followed. _I love you, Sam. I'm completely in love with you._

_ I love you too._

And that's when I panicked. Maybe things were moving too fast. Maybe we were being rash, and maybe New York and this 'fresh start' was making us people we weren't. Maybe we were being influenced by our new friends and the people around us, most of who were in relationships and drinking up the romance kool-aid. Maybe this was all wrong. Maybe this wasn't for us.

I didn't push those thoughts into the back of my mind. I didn't have to. Sam and I were both there, crying out each others' names and finishing after what seemed like hours. We didn't waste any time getting redressed in the freezing weather.

I looked into her eyes, and I thought of my panic. And as I did, I had my answer.

We weren't making a fairytale for ourselves; we'd tried so long to avoid it. We'd been trying to avoid who we really were.

This, in all of its unresolved, confusing, romantic glory, was completely right. It was a long time coming, and for every reason that made it wrong, it was _right._

We were breaking the rules. We were being young and reckless. We were doing something that everyone from Seattle would probably frown at, because knowing our history, they would be wondering, _"how _have they not killed each other yet?"

I couldn't believe I was only realizing it just then.

Of course I fell in love with Sam. We went through hell together, and when everything seemed messed up, we were there for each other. Yeah, emotional sex with her was wrong, but so right. We could never get enough of each other. Because at the end of the day, for everything bad that happened to us and for all of the hell we'd put each other through throughout our lives, we kept coming back together, with or without Carly.

"You know," she said, as we walked through Central park. "You'd think today was my twenty-first birthday based on how scandalous that was."

That got a laugh out of me. "Well. I'd do scandal with you any day."

"Oh, don't lie. You were ready to shit yourself, scared-y-pants."

"Kind of true. Aren't you glad I kept it together, then?"

She kicked me, and the two of us laughed all the way back to The Village. So we were back to our sarcasm and witty banter. But, what could I say? What we had was romance, but we definitely weren't romantic. So maybe we _did _have our moments, and maybe we _would _get more romantic as time went on. But for now, I was fine with the unresolved, make-it-up-as-we-go-along relationship, because, hey, we had one. That's what mattered.

XXX

**A/N: **I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter! It's up there with _Lies and Walls _as one of my favorites, and the reason for that _may _or may not be the lemons, heheh. This is probably as explicit as the sex scenes are going to get, because I really don't like sex for the sake of sex in FF.

Now, I have to say something about reviews in regards to this fic. You guys know that I'm pretty good about not groveling for them, and I don't like it when other authors are beg for them so I tend not to. But _Reach _is by far my longest, most under-reviewed fic. It's gotten over 26 thousand hits, which I'm ecstatic about; but that means that less than _half _a percent of readers have reviewed. (Yes, you read that right.) As someone who reviews every fic I read, that's a little upsetting. Most of you are aspiring writers and FF authors yourselves, so you guys know firsthand how hard it is to get reviews and how much it sucks when you have x amount of hits and no reviews. Fanfiction is not all about getting reviews, and I know that. But I put a lot of time into these chapters and into this fic.

I love _Reach, _it's my FF baby, so I'd really appreciate it if you guys would take a second or two to write a review. I'm seeing this fic through to the end regardless of how many reviews I get, but I'm asking this of you guys because I deserve this much as an author, and because without feedback, there's no way for me to get better.

As always, thanks so much for reading. I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter, and I'll see you all soon with an update :D

xx Nina


	19. Piecing Our Lives Back Together

_Reach for Something That's Already Gone_

Chapter Twenty

_Piecing our Lives Back Together_

And then came the part where we fell in love for real.

I'd known Sam for twelve years by the time we'd picked up our lives and moved to New York. She wasn't always the easiest person to deal with, but Carly was the glue that'd kept us together for so many years. Now we were making it on our own. We were living our lives in a new city, with new friends and a new take on everything.

We didn't just grow together; we grew with the people around us. Nina and Sam ran together on a regular basis, and as Will and I started to hang out I realized fast enough how similar we were. To say we got along well would be an understatement.

"I was the shy kid in high school," he admitted to me one day. "You know, Devon had to set me up with an ex-girlfriend of his so I could get a Prom date."

"For real?"

"Mhm." He cracked a smile. "She was still infatuated with him, of course."

"So why'd she go with you?"

He shrugged. "Beats me. But she would do anything for Devon—actually, that's probably why she said yes when he asked her to take me."

"Well . . . was she hot at least?"

He laughed. "Freddie. My brother doesn't date ugly girls."

I could see that. Devon and I didn't particularly click, but him and Sam ran together, so they went back and forth with plenty of witty banter. 'Witty' meaning he'd try to woo her and she'd shut him down, but it was still pretty funny.

The winter came and went; Christmas was celebrated in upstate New York, with the Hudsons and a few other people. We met Kenzie and Darcy that trip, Nina's two closest friends from high school, and Julia and James came up with us all.

I was stuck with dish duty after Christmas dinner. We'd rented a condo at a popular ski resort, so everyone else was passed out on the couch either drunk or exhausted from a day on the mountain when it came time for cleanup. Julia walked into the kitchen as I was scrubbing at the plates, trying to scrape off potato chunks with failure.

"Here, let me help you," she said, reaching in for a sponge.

"No, it's okay, I've got it."

She offered me a smile, taking a plate anyway and scrubbing with me. "Don't be ridiculous."

We cleaned in comfortable silence for a bit before the small talk picked up. "So how do you know Will and Devon?" I asked.

"Hmm. Are you still piecing together the stories of our lives?"

"Eh, kind of."

She laughed. "I knew Will first, we were friends in college."

Ahh. So that explained it. Of everyone I'd met in New York, Julia wasn't like the rest of them.

"Must've been a wild night, huh?" I teased.

She laughed. "Oh, totally." Then she shook her head. "Nahh, we were in the same Lit class, so we became library buddies."

"You mean, special library buddies?"

She raised a brow, and that was enough to get both of us laughing.

"I see why Sam's into you—you've got a sense of humor, Benson. Shame we didn't get to see it on iCarly."

I shrugged. It was a harmless statement, her mentioning it, but the label of being 'that iCarly star' was proving to be something that would stick no matter how many miles I put between myself and Seattle.

"Joking aside, Will's a completely platonic friend of mine," she specified. I was grateful for the subject change.

"Hmm, really?"

"Yep."

"So was there anyone else in college?"

"Eh," she went, but from the inflection she put into that one syllable I could tell there was a lot more to that story then she let on. I didn't pry, because something told me that even if I did, Julia would keep a pretty tight lip. "What about you?" she asked.

"What d'you mean?"

"Well, what was college like for you?"

I laughed starkly. "Oh, I didn't go." I cleared my throat. "Ca-" I stopped short. "There were some things in Seattle Sam and I needed to deal with," I phrased carefully.

Julia gave me a look, and it clearly read, _it's okay, you don't have to tell me_.

More small talked ensued. She asked me how I liked New York, and I asked her how long she'd been living in the City for.

"Oh, I've never left. I've lived here since I was born."

"What school did you go to?"

"I went to Columbia for undergrad," she said.

Ahh. I figured as much, but now I knew for a fact that she was smart. "Columbia. Jesus."

"Yeah," she said with a smile. She'd been scrubbing at the same red pot for over ten minutes. "I've been applying to different grad schools, but I'm not locked in anywhere just yet."

I nodded. Our college conversation ended there, and she brightly shifted gears. "So. Are you sick of our crazy just yet?"

"Completely," I drawled, my voice dripping with sarcasm. "No, you guys have been great. Seriously. Sam and I didn't expect to fit in to city life so quickly."

"Well, you're welcome," she replied.

I'd always had a good feeling about her, but after that conversation, I decided that I really liked Julia. Sure, she was everything you'd expect her to be at first glance-reserved, plain, and, okay, maybe even a little boring. It wasn't like I was anyone to judge. But something about her was just . . . well, I can't even place my finger on it. But I knew that becoming good friends with her would be as easy as becoming good friends with Will.

XXX

By New Year's Eve we'd headed back into the city. Nina and her high school friends had stuck around in Ski-ville, so the rest of us hightailed it back for Sandra's New Year's party. We'd gotten the forewarnment from Devon beforehand ("y'all don't have to worry, there will be plenty of alcohol!"), so Sandra's state of mind when we got to the door wasn't any surprise.

"You guys!" She squealed. She threw her arms around all of us. "I'm so glad you could make it!"

Everyone was there. Devon, Will, Julia, and even James and the Newlyweds.

We counted down to the New Year together. With eight seconds to go, Sam grabbed my hand. We jumped the gun and starting kissing with two seconds left.

By the time we got back to our apartment, we were tired and we were drunk, but that didn't stop us from trying to get it in. (Okay, so it wasn't exactly good. But we gave it an effort.)

Sam started laughing after we finished. "Ugh. I'm off my game tonight."

"You and me both."

She nestled her head in my chest, which I noticed she had a habit of doing when she was under the influence. "We'll try again tomorrow. Another year, another fuck."

"Mhm."

We didn't say anything for a minute.

"Hey, Sam?"

"Hmm?"

"Happy New Year."

"Ahhh. I love you."

With that, she fell asleep.

XXX

Thinking back to that time now, I completely took it all for granted. From the nights we spent out to the morning runs I forced myself into doing to the food we ate and the people we met, I didn't realize just how good things were. Just how good Sam and I had it. We were doing the impossible, we were doing it together, and at the time, we didn't even know it.

At the time, Sam and I kind of just went along with these new friendships. We were meeting new people, yeah, but we didn't realize just how lucky we were and how good we had it. To this day, I can still remember incredibly vivid but scattered details about each of them. Like how Laura had a beauty mark on her right cheek, how James' ears would turn red when he had too much to drink, how Sandra would start snorting when she laughed too hard…

Oh, Sam and I knew we were making a new life for ourselves. But I don't think we ever really realized the gravity of what that meant.

Even now, looking back, the months start to blur together. The weeks that pass and the memories we shared get jumbled because each was better than the next, and because, all the while, we were taking things day by day.

Days, weeks, and months passed. Winter became Spring. Every New York minute was worth it.

XXX

"C'mon, Sam, hustle! Let's pick it up—d'you want to be somebody or not?"

Only Devon and Nina could get away with screaming at her like that. I stared at them, dumbfounded, clapping my hands and feebly cheering as I watched the two of them. They were shouting like football coaches.

"Catch her, Sammy, you're at six minute pace, keep it up and it's yours."

It was just the three of us cheering her on that day. It was a cold February day, and well below freezing in the City. Instead of cuddling up with a cup of coffee like sensible human beings, I was cheering my girlfriend on at a 5K with her two closest friends. Typical.

We cut the course, going from the second mile mark to the third. We got to the sidelines just in time, because she barreling down the street in blazing speed.

We looked at the clock and just about flipped a shit.

_"You've got it! You've got it! Pass her, you've got it!"_

She barely missed first place, but she crossed the line in 18:12. She walked over to us, a medal around her neck and a big smile plastered across her face.

"Casual," she said.

Devon and Nina practically tackled her to the ground in a victory hug, so I waited until they were done before going in for a kiss. As I pulled away, she whispered into my ear,

"Victory sex tonight?"

I laughed in response. "Yeah, that seems to be in order."

The four of us grabbed lunch that day, warming up with platters of spaghetti and meatballs at a restaurant in Soho. I picked at mine and watched the three of them gorge themselves, shoveling food in their mouths like they'd never see it again. Oh. So _that _was where Sam got her barbaric eating habits from.

"Y'know," Nina said, turning to Sam, "You're beating little miss Stub Legs next time."

"Aww hell yeah." Devon nodded his head in agreement. "That bitch is built like a bulldog. Take her down, why don't ya?"

"She's _fast,"_ Sam drawled.

"Yeah, and so are you," I told her. "Devon, could you pass the salt?"

"Will do." He handed it over.

"Damnit!" Nina exclaimed. She looked up from her cellphone, grumbling. "I told Melissa a dozen times I couldn't make it into the office today, if I get _one more _empty threat from her via text, I'll shoot myself."

"Ahhh, Melissa." Devon sighed, smiling. "The super-bitch boss lady. Not gonna lie, that's pretty hot."

Nina kicked him under the table, and then turned to me. "So. Speaking of work, how's Best Buy been treating you?"

"Oh, y'know, the same—"

"He hates it," Sam interjected.

"Really?"

I nodded. Kinda true. It's not like I complained about it, but Sam could tell. "It's just not the right environment for me—"

"—he's stuck with minimum wage high school dropouts and teenagers," Sam filled in.

"For a guy that used to run iCarly," Devon said, taking a swig of water, "I'd never have thought you'd be working at Best Buy."

I shrugged. "It's hard to find work in this economy. Especially without a college education."

"Bullshit." I was on the verge of getting frustrated with Devon, but then he added, "I dropped out. Started taking night classes last year, and I've got the job I want now."

"Wait—"

"—for real?"

Both me and Sam jumped at Devon, and he laughed at our eagerness. "Yeah, I'm studying at NYU. Goin' for my sports science major."

"How much is tuition?"

"Peanuts, compared to what it could be," he replied. Sam and I looked at each other warily. It wasn't until Christmas—when the Hudsons picked up the tab for a condo that cost over a thousand dollars a night—that we figured they were loaded. "Peanuts" to blue-collared ex web-stars meant a whole lot less than "peanuts" to Southern aristocracy.

"NYU's in state," Nina added. "And since you're New York residents, I can't imagine it being over ten grand a year."

I looked over to Sam. She shrugged, her indifference seeming forced. Sitting next to her, I could tell her heart was pounding.

"I'll have to talk to my mom about this later," I said, turning to Sam. She nodded.

Our conversation about college ended there, and chit-chat and gossip about the others ensued. From time to time, I'd squeeze Sam's hand from under the table. _We're doing this, _it said. _This is happening. We're getting educated and we're getting the jobs we want._

It was happening gradually, but happening all the same. We were piecing back together the lives that Carly Shay had destroyed.

XXX

Laura's baby shower was in early March, a good month before her due date. With her being 5'9" and Darius standing over six feet tall, it isn't any surprise that at eight months, her stomach protruded like she'd stuffed a basketball under it.

"He's gonna be _huuuuuuge," _Darius said, putting a hand on his wife's belly. She laughed, pecking him on the forehead and saying,

"Stop being gender specific.I think she's a girl."

"You guys haven't checked the sex?" I asked.

She shook her head. "Nahhh, we wanted to be surprised. Dumbo here thinks it's a boy, but we _both _know she's a girl."

"She _can't _be female," he drawled. "You're her mother, d'you have any idea how gorgeous she'd be? Like I want to fend off the assholes that'd be after starting age _five."_

_ "_Well, even if this one is a boy, does that mean—"

"Yep. We're only having boys."

"I'm not so sure they'll all be such asshole magnets, tough guy." She poked his chest. "After all, their genes are fifty percent yours—they could just as well inherit your funny looks."

"Yeah, and my charm." He wrapped his arms around her and starting kissing her head, the two of them laughing. Luke, her little brother who was standing right there, looked at the two of them in disgust.

"Jesus, get a room!"

Laura made a point to introduce us to the rest of her family. She was the third of four siblings, and her two older sisters were named Grete and Lea. Like Laura, Grete was also gorgeous, and based on the way she interacted with her husband, we could tell she was a flirt back in her younger days. Her hair was dark and she was in her late twenties, and she already had two kids (both of which we met, but I couldn't remember their names for the life of me.) Lea was a little over thirty, and also beautiful. We wondered why she didn't have a husband or kids in tow, given this family's affinity for young marriages, but the minute she opened her mouth Sam and I recognized oldest-sibling bossiness on _crack. _And then there was Luke, the baby of them all at just twenty, who played the annoying younger brother role. But when I caught him on his own, he seemed like a nice kid.

After that, Sam gravitated towards Nina just about as much as I gravitated towards Will, so we didn't really see each other until Sandra was banging her fork on a glass. "Toast, toast!" she called.

Everyone in the room quieted down, turning their attention to Sandra.

She cleared her throat. "I've known Laura and Darius since we were all kids. I remember being eight years old and sharing the same bunk as her in camp, and us talking about our perfect future—a big wedding, a white picket fence, and house full of kids." Sandra gestured towards the apartment. "Well, there aren't that many white picket fences in midtown, I can tell you that much." That got a chortle from everyone. "But most of us were here for the big wedding, and now, we're all celebrating the 'lots of kids' part of that perfect future."

"Here here!" Nina cheered, raising her glass. Everyone joined in.

Sandra lifted her champagne over her head, stretching her arm like the statue of liberty. "A toast," she said, "to _this _little rascal, and to many more."

"Cheers!" Devon called out.

That was when we all went around clinking glasses. From across the room I looked at Sam, who was laughing and mingling with Nina and Devon's friends. I thought of our time with Carly, fleetingly, and then I thought of how she looked now.

She definitely didn't smile this much after Spencer's death.

She looked over from across the room, and her eyes met mine. And she gave me a smile that said it all.

We were exactly where we belonged.

XXX

**A/N: I really hope you guys enjoyed this one! Kind of a little filler-y, but we're clipping right along with the timeline, so expect the drama to pick up in a little bit. **

**Thank you all so much for your incredibly kind responses to the last chapter, it really meant the world to me.**

**A quick note on my plans for **_**Reach; **_**I think I'm going to take some time off from this fic, so expect the next update to be something in early February. Between now and then school's going to be hell, what with midterms and AP qualification, and I have a **_**lot **_**on my fanfiction plate right now concerning my Hunger Games related fics. Don't worry, I haven't lost inspiration for this fic, I just need a brief hiatus to get my grades together. (I'm a junior in high school. What I'd give to be a bloody senior right now.)**

**Have a lovely new year, everyone xx**

**xx Nina**


	20. Old Ties

_Reach For Something That's Already Gone_

By Ninazadzia

_Old Ties_

* * *

><p>We were lucky to have our New York friends, and we knew it. Of all of the people in that city, yeah, the odds of us finding a group of fun, young-at-heart people certainly weren't slim—we'd just found it a lot faster than we'd anticipated. So for our first six months in New York, there wasn't a minute when we felt lonely. We'd gone from Seattle (where we'd had next to nothing) to this bustling sphere of <em>people.<em>

I laughed to myself, bitterly. I looked to the walls of the coffeeshop. _You're not in New York anymore, Freddie. You're in Seattle. And you want to know why?_

_ You didn't have "next to nothing" here_.

It's only apparent now. "Now" meaning after-the-fact, after the last decade has gone by. Sam and I would get our first rude awakening of just how much our impromptu-move had cost us after about six months of living in New York. And our rude awakening came in one of the most innocent, least-rude ways possible.

It came in the form of a wedding invitation. A wedding invitation from Melanie Puckett.

* * *

><p>"Have you checked the mail yet?"<p>

Sam snorted. "Hmm, let me think; we live on the eighth floor, our elevator is currently broken, and it's one-hundred and three degrees outside."

"Yeah. Your point?"

"I've done _nothing _except sit on my ass all day." She grabbed the remote and changed the channel, nestling her head deeper into my shoulder.

"Didn't you run, like, twelve miles this morning?"

"Yeah."

"That's not sitting on your ass all day."

"Oh, come on," she laughed. "That's nothing!"

"Humblebrag." I shoved her. "So you can run twelve miles, but you can't walk down eight flights of stairs?"

_"Ughhhhh_," she groaned. "Fine, fine. I'll go get the mail."

She stood up and dusted the crumbs off of her white tank top. Before she walked away, I grasped her arm, and pulled her face up against mine.

She kissed me, and then gently slapped me across the jaw. "_You owe me,"_ she said, wagging a finger in my face. "You lazy piece of shit."

I laughed as she walked away. "Love you too!" I called as she shut the door.

I spent her two-minute absence flipping through the TV channels. I paused as the "local on the 8's" weather report came on. My heart sank. "It looks like this heat wave isn't going away until late _next week_, with the highs still in the upper nineties for the next few days." Mays in New York were nothing like Mays in Seattle. Seattle weather was mild in the summer, thanks to the Pacific Northwest's typical abundance of rain. In between New York's humidity and just how much concrete and pavement was packed into five boroughs, the city experienced temperature extremes like no where else in the tri-state area. But even then, high nineties was _hot _for mid-may in Manhattan.

I then heard my apartment door open and close. "Hey," I hollered. "Did you know that it's only going to cool down on Thursday at the earliest?

She didn't answer. I turned to look at her, and she dropped a large, white envelope into my lap.

"What's this?" I asked.

"Not sure, but the return address is from Melanie," she said.

"Melanie?" I turned the TV off. "As in, your _twin_, Melanie?"

"Yeah," she tapped the sticker in the top left-hand corner. "See for yourself—Melanie Puckett and Jason Barry."

"Who the hell is Jason Barry?"

"That's what I said," she replied. I ripped the envelope open with my finger, and she plopped down next to me. I pulled out a large, embossed letter.

_We cordially invite you to celebrate the union of_

_Melanie Elizabeth Puckett_

_And_

_Jason Seth Barry_

_In Holy Matrimony_

_On August 3__rd__, 2018_

We must've read that letter a dozen times over. I didn't know what I expected to happen—for the words to rearrange, for the damn thing to disappear into thin air, something, _anything._ Okay, so it's a wedding invitation—big deal, right? Well, it was—and it shouldn't have been. For any normal adult, receiving your sister's wedding invitation should hypothetically be a _good thing_. But Sam and I looked each other in the eye, and we both wore the same expression.

_Fuck_.

"I'm officially the world's worst sister."

"Sam—"

"I didn't even know she had a _boyfriend!"_ She tore the invitation from my grasp. "Much less a _fiancé!_ God, I can't even tell you the last time I spoke to her!"

"C'mon, that's not true. You guys talked all of the time. I remember."

"Yeah, when we were in _high school_." She stood up, pacing the room as she re-read the invitation over and over again. "What a saint, my fucking sister." She waved the invitation in my face. "She didn't have to send this to me, you know. But she did anyway."

Her face fell, and I sat in silence for a minute. I couldn't exactly argue with her; Melanie could've gotten married two years ago, and Sam and I would've been none the wiser. That was just how estranged we were from out old lives. It's not like Melanie didn't try, either—when Sam was with Tyler, she'd come up to Seattle every once in a while. She'd bring whatever guy she was dating at the time, and they'd go on double dates. We'd be at clubs, and Melanie would call her, but Sam would always reject it. "I'll talk to her later," she'd say wistfully. It's not like she did it on purpose—it just became a force of habit. Like she didn't have the time to talk to her sister.

_Kind of like you don't have the time to talk to your mother._

That's when it hit me. "Sam," I said. She turned, and looked to me. "When's the last time you've spoken to your mom?"

She paused. "I couldn't tell you." Another pause. "If I had to guess, before we moved here."

Yeah, that sounded familiar. _Before New York. Before Spencer. _We used to be best friends with Gibby, until Spencer happened. I used to keep in contact with a lot of friends from High School, until Carly became co-dependent on Sam and I. And my overbearing, overprotective mom—who I desperately wanted to get away from in high school—had even learned to give up. She'd call me, and she'd visit me, and she'd text me and facebook me and even send me _letters_, but I never really reciprocated. It's not like I meant to—just force of habit.

I was too busy. Too busy being wrapped up in Carly Shay's problems.

The thought came to me before I could stop it.

_Only now, you and Sam are too busy being wrapped up in each other._

And then I thought, _no. No Freddie, you can't think like that._

"Well, it looks like we've really cut all of our old ties," I said, drily.

"Yeah. We have."

Our families. Our old friends. We'd traded everything in—for each other and for New York, to be specific.

And then, I cleared my throat. "I don't know about you, but I'm definitely—"

"Happier this way?" I stopped short, looking at her. I felt my jaw drop. "C'mon, Freddie, I'm not a dumbass." She walked over and sat down next to me. "I'd trade Sandra and company for the shit we were putting up with from Carly in a heartbeat."

"Would you trade your sister for it, though? For this?"

She sighed. "Well, it looks like I already did."

We didn't say anything for a minute. I thought of what she said. _I'm happier this way._ Were we really, though? That wasn't even a question—of course we were. Yeah, we probably lived in the leakiest apartment in Greenwich Village. Yeah, we were next to broke, thanks to our slightly-above minimum wage income. But we weren't Carly Shay's life support. We weren't living our lives on her terms.

"So." I cleared my throat. "Are we going to this wedding, or not?"

Sam scanned through the invitation. "It's in Phoenix," she said, slowly. "So we have an excuse _not _to."

"Yeah. We can say we're too broke."

"It's not exactly a lie." She shifted her weight, and then waited a minute before saying, "We're going."

"Are you sure?"

"Mhm. You look online for plane tickets—in the meantime, I'm going to give my sister a call."

* * *

><p><strong>AN: "I think that my next update is going to be sometime in early February." Jesus Christ, I'm such a fucking liar.**

**I always feel like I have my tail between my legs when I write the "I'm sorry I haven't updated in x-amount of months" author's note, if you know what I mean. (Not to say that I don't deserve it, because I definitely do.) It **_**has **_**been ages, so I feel like it's unfair for me to not at least mention the 16-month absence I've had from this fic.**

**I'll say this—I reached a point where I went, "yeah, I'm done. I just can't anymore. This fic is getting too long, I'm no where close to the end, no one's reviewing this damn thing, so I might as well just leave it as-is and focus on other things." I never thought I'd write another word of **_**Reach**_**, especially as the months wore on. 16 months is (by FAR) the longest I've ever gone without updating a fic.**

**But, you know what? I'm going to finish what I started. I had a vision for this story, and I want to see it carried out. I don't care if I don't get a single review from here on out, because that's not what it's about—it's about keeping the creative juices GOING, from the beginning to the end.**

**Thanks so much to pigwiz and random sass for reinspiring me. This chapter (and the continuation of this fic) is all you two.**

**Also, as a side-note—I re-read the ENTIRE thing so I could refresh my memory on the plot/foreshadowing I'd planted. If you haven't read this fic in 16 months (like I hadn't), you might want to do the same, at least to avoid confusion :D**

**xx Nina**


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